speakeasy
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English[edit]
Etymology[edit]
Deverbal from speak easy (= speak quietly [interj.]); for the history, see Wikipedia at speakeasy § Etymology.
Noun[edit]
speakeasy (plural speakeasies or speakeasys)
- (historical) An illegal saloon or tavern, especially one operated during the American Prohibition period in the 1920s.
- Synonyms: blind pig, blind tiger
- 1946, George Johnston, Skyscrapers in the Mist, page 90:
- Many of the legitimate nightclubs of today sprang like legalized phoenixes from the still-hot ashes of the speakeasies of prohibition days.
- 2020, David Rosen, Prohibition New York City, Arcadia Publishing, →ISBN, page 39:
- Retuning[sic] to Gotham, he came to intimately know Manhattan's speakeasy scene. “At a speakeasy,” Hirschfeld acknowledged, “you had to be known to get in...each place had its own clientele.” Membership cards, really fake IDs, were common.
Usage notes[edit]
Connotations of a classy establishment—some required coat and tie—compared with a more downmarket blind pig or blind tiger.
Derived terms[edit]
Translations[edit]
illegal saloon operated during the Prohibition period
