Tavern Towns

The great article “Liberty Inn” (June/July 2003) could have gone even farther in demonstrating how much early-day taverns influenced the American landscape. My book, Peculiar, Uncertain, and Two Egg (Cumberland House, 2000), lists a number of communities, almost all in the East, that have names taken from taverns of yesteryear: Bird in Hand and Broad Axe (Pennsylvania); Three Tuns and Seven Stars (New Jersey); Blue Ball and Cross Keys (Delaware), to name a few. There are many more. Incidentally, the caption on page 28 did contain one minor error. It states that the “Murdock Alehouse would have been perfectly recognizable to Colonel Murdock.” Not quite, not as long as that one-eyed monster is in the corner on a shelf.