November, 2015 - Lady Stahope - Mexico Martini

Lady Stanhope

Charming and witty, Lady Stanhope was an admired socialite in English high society.  But after a string of messy romances, she left England forever at the age of 33, and went on to become the first Biblical archaeologist.  She journeyed to Greece, Turkey, France, and Germany.

En route to Egypt, Stanhope discarded her feminine and European attire for menswear of most common in Tunisia, a look that would prove her signature the rest of her days.  She traversed through Israel, Lebanon, and Syria.  Later, she'd tell tales of how she so impressed the Bedouin tribes that they named her Queen of the Desert, successor to Zenobia.  But her greatest success came in 1815, when she convinced Ottoman authorities to allow her to excavate the ruins of Ashkelon. Stanhope went looking for gold, but instead found a seven-foot headless marble statue.  Her reputation as an archaeologist takes a hit here, as she ordered the artifact smashed to bits.

The Drink

Mexico Martini
1 1/2 oz tequila
1 spt extra dry vermouth
2-3 drops vanilla extract

Drinkability:  2
Drunkability:  5
Taxic Diversity:  4
Accessibility:  4
Priority for Conservation:  2

Comments:  "Very strange - vanilla, water, vermouth, frosting - it smells sweet but isn't"

From Women Who Traveled, hosted by Bandit Queen

November, 2015 - Nelly Bly - Aviation

Nelly Bly

American journalist Nellie Bly (a.ka. Elizabeth Jane Cochrane) is best known for her world-changing expose' for which she went undercover to reveal the abuse going on at Women's Lunatic Asylum on Blackwell's Island.  But on November 14, 1889, Bly took on a new challenge for Joseph Pulitzer's paper, the New York World.

Inspired by Jules Verne's novel Around the World in 80 Days, Bly set out to beat the fictional globetrotting record.  Traveling in ships, trains, and rickshaws, on horseback and on mules, Bly made her way from England to France, Singapore to Japan, and California back to the East Coast.  And she did all this in 72 days.  Well, 72 days, 6 hours, 11 minutes and 14 seconds to be precise.  Naturally, Bly's bold endeavor made for a series of thrilling new stories, as well as a memoir - Around the World in Seventy-Two Days.

The Drink

Aviation

4.5 cl gin
1.5 cl lemon juice
1.5 cl maraschino liquer
1/4 oz creme de violette

Drinkability:  3
Drunkability:  4
Taxic Diversity:  3
Accessibility:  3
Priority for Conservation:  **

Comments:  ** we have had this at a few parties before, and it's a favorite of BallBuster and Alabazam

From Women Who Traveled, hosted by Bandit Queen

November, 2015 - Aimee Crocker - Blue Lagoon

Aimee Crocker

An American railroad heiress born in 1864, Aimee Crocker was infamous for her lavish parties and long list of lovers and husbands.  She was a frequent subject of society gossip and a proud friend of Oscar Wilde.  But when the public attention became too much, Crocker took off on a tour of the Far East.

On route, she detoured to Hawaii, where she met King Kalakaua, who -- according to her memoir And I'd Do It Again -- was so enchanted with her that he gave her an island and the title Princess Palaikalani (which is said to translate to "Bliss of Heaven").  Crocker's book offers a slew of other outrageous encounters, including run-ins with headhunters in Borneo, a would-be murderer in Shanghai, and a sultry boa constrictor in India.  After ten years abroad, Crocker returned with wild tales, tattoos, a devotion ot Buddhism, and a whole new allure for the high society of America.

The Drink

Blue Lagoon

50ml vodka
20ml blue curacao
100ml lemonade
1 orange slice

Drinkability:  5
Drunkability:  2
Taxic Diversity:  2
Accessibility:  3
Priority for Conservation:  4

Comments:  Alabazam was throwing off the curve in rating.

From Women Who Traveled, hosted by Bandit Queen

November, 2015 - Gertrude Bell - Sex on the Beach

Gertrude Bell 

A contemporary and colleague of T.E. Lawrence (a.k.a Lawrence of Arabia), Gertrude Bell was a writer and archaeologist who traveled all around the Middle East, Asia, and Europe.  Her books gave the people of Great Britain a clear concept of the empire's outer territories and are still studied today.

An Oxford graduate who was fluent in Persian and Arabic, she met Lawrence while working in the Arab Bureau in Cairo during World War I.  She's best known for her contribution to the Conference in Cairo in 1921, where the beginnings of Iraq as a nation were forged.  She'd later pioneer the school of thought that relics and antiquities should be preserved in their home national.  The National Museum of Iraq was born from her efforts.

The Drink:

Sex on the Beach

4 cl vodka
4 cl Peach schnapps
4 cl orange juice
4 cl cranberry juice

Drinkability: 4
Drunkability:  3
Taxic Diversity:  3.5
Accessibility:  4
Priority for Conservation:  4

Comments:  BallBuster was enthusiastic about this one

From "Women Who Traveled" hosted by Bandit Queen

September, 2015 - Ella Baker - Capri

Ella Baker (1903 - 1986)

Baker was born in Norfolk Virginia and grew up in North Carolina.  She studied at Shaw University in Raleigh, and graduated as valedictorian.  She moved to NYC to join social activist organizations.  In 1930, she joined the Young Negroes Cooperative League, whose purpose was to develop black economic power through collective planning.  She began to work with the NAACP in 1940 as a field secretary and then served as a director of branches from 1943-6.  In 1957, she moved to Atlanta to help organize the Southern Christian Leadership Conference.  In 1960, she left to assist the new student activists from North Carolina A&T University who refused to leave a Woolworth's lunch counter in Greensboro, NC.  Under her mentorship, the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee was born.  SNCC joined with the Congress of Racial Equality to organize the 1961 Freedom Rides.  She was highly respected civil rights leader who mostly worked "behind the scenes" advising, supporting, and mentoring greats like WEB Dubois, Thurgood Marshall, Martin Luther King Jr., and Rosa Parks.  Baker's reputation as a leader and movement builder earned her the nickname "Fundi," Swahili for a person who teaches craft to the next generation.

The Drink:

Capri Cocktail:

1.5 oz gin
.5 oz limoncello
.25 oz peach schnapps
1 oz grapefruit juice
1 oz mango juice
dash of orgeat syrup

Drinkability:  4
Drunkability:  3
Taxic Diversity:  3
Accessibility:  2
Priority for Conservation:  3

Comments:

From "Women of the Civil Rights Movement" hosted by BallBuster

September, 2015 - Viola Gregg Liuzzo - Mamie Taylor

Viola Gregg Liuzzo (1925-1965)

"We're going to change the world.  One day they'll write about us.  You'll see."

Liuzzo was born in Pennsylvania and lived in Detroit with her second husband and five children.  Politically and socially active, Liuzzo was a member of the Detriot chapter of the NAACP.  After "Bloody Sunday," when civil rights supporters were attacked by police in Selma, Liuzzo traveled to Alabama. On march 21, 1965, more than 3,000 marched from Selma to Montgomery to campaign for voting rights for African Americans in the South.  During the march, Liuzzo drove supporters between Selma and Montgomery.  That night, Liuzzo was driving another civil rigths worker with the SCLC - an African-American teenager named Leroy Moton -- back to Selma on Highway 80, when another car pulled alongside her vehicle.  One of the passengers in the neighboring car shot at Liuzzo, striking her in the face and killing her.  Moton survived the attack by pretending to be dead.  The police arrested four members of the Ku Klux Klah for the killing, one of which was revealed to be an FBI informant.  They were acquitted by an all-white jury on state charges related to the crime, but were later convicted on federal charges.  Despite efforts to discredit Liuzzo driven by J. Edgar Hoover, Director of the FBI, her murder led President Lyndon B. Johnson to order an investigation into the Ku Klux Klan.  It is also believed that her death helped encourage legislators to pass the Voting Rights Act of 1965.

The Drink:

Mamie Taylor

2 oz blended scotch
.5 oz fresh lime juice
2-5 oz chilled ginger ale
lemon slice
on the rocks

Drinkability:  4
Drunkability:  3
Taxic Diversity:  2
Accessibility:  4
Priority for Conservation:  4

Comments:  

From "Women of the Civil Rights Movement" hosted by BallBuster

September, 2015 - Fannie Lou Hamer - Brainstorm

Fannie Lou Hamer (1917 - 1977)

"Nobody's free until everybody's free"

Hamer was born in Montgomery County, Mississippi.  She was the youngest of 20 children.  Her parents were sharecroppers and she began working the fields when she was only 6 years old.  She continued to be a share cropper after her 1944 marriage to Perry "Pap" Hamer.  In 1962, she attended a protest meeting and met civil rights activists who encouraged blacks and register to vote, and soon became active in the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee, which fought racial segregation and injustice in the South.  During the course of her activist career, Hamer was threatened, arrested, beaten, and shot at.  She was severely injured in 1963 in Winona, Mississippi jail when she and two other activists were taken in by police after attending a training workshop.  Hamer was beaten so badly that she suffered permanent kidney damage.  In 1964, she helped found the Mississippi Freedom Democratic Party, and ran for Congress in Mississippi in 1965.  Fannie also helped to establish the National Women's Political Caucus in 1971.  Hamer died in 1977 from breast cancer.

The Drink:

Brainstorm:

1.5 oz Irish whiskey
1.5 oz dry vermouth
.25 oz benedictine
lemon twist

Drinkability:  2
Drunkability:  4.5
Taxic Diversity:  3
Accessibility:  3
Priority for Conservation:  3

Comments:  PoC is a 3 if you dial down the vermouth just a bit.

From "Women of the Civil Rights Movement" hosted by BallBuster