The table at the Beer Institute web site (which either my browser or the
institute forbids me from consulting in detail) apparently lists the
population of counties that are dry for beer sales. There are a lot more
counties that are wet for beer but dry for spirits. The state with the most
dry counties is Kentucky; when I wrote "Drink: a social history of America"
(a year ago) 75 of its 121 counties were totally dry and a further 24
prohibited the sale of spirits but allowed wine and beer. This may have
changed, as counties all across the country are increasingly voting to go
wet, especially as rural areas are settled by people from cities and more
conservative southern areas are settled by northerners. I also believe that
the ridiculous restrictions on the sale and even the tasting of bourbon by
distillers situated in dry counties have been eased a little. In 1997 Roger
Brashears, the promotions manager of Jack Daniels, was asked by a visiting
British journalist, who was amazed at the number of dry counties in
Tennessee, whether anyone drank at all in the state. "Yes, ma'am," he
replied. "It's just that we don't do it in front of each other."
Andrew Barr.