Charleston's Oldest Commercial Building and the Nation's Longest Operating Liquor Store

On an early trip to Charleston many years ago, I stood on East Bay Street framing the colorful Georgian houses of Rainbow Row in the viewfinder of my camera. On the same corner, a young woman was making preparations to immortalize the pastel scene on canvas. Unknown to me at the time, the two of us were engaging in a popular tradition common to many of the city's locals and tourists. This well-known historic landmark of the French Quarter is for obvious reasons the most photographed and painted of the Holy City.

However, in the midst of this most recognizable attraction unassumingly sits the oldest commercial building in the Holy City with the added distinction of being the nation's longest-operating liquor store. Located just two blocks from the old city's bustling waterfront, this part of the original walled city of the late 1600's was anything but holy. It was the rompin', stompin' playground for pirates and den of iniquity for seafarer's. Members of Blackbeard's crew, not Blackbeard himself, more than likely prowled and drank liquor from this establishment along with Stede Bonnet and a host of other pirates, many of whom were hung a short distance away in White Point Gardens.

The Tavern at Rainbow Row dates as far back as 1686 according to discovered documents and maps found in Scotland and the Netherlands. Quite possibly Captain William Carse and crew of the Magdalen from Edinborough purchased liquor from the establishment in August of 1743 after unloading its cargo of salt, sailcloth, and, among other items, 96 golf clubs and 432 golf balls consigned to David Deas, a Scottish emigrant who had become a successful Charleston merchant.

Through its three centuries of business, The Tavern has endured the test of unstoppable and sometimes hard-pressed time. It survived the Revolutionary War and the incessant pummeling from the Federal cannons of the Civil War, not to leave unmentioned the numerous historic fires and catastrophic earthquake of 1886 that brought down hundreds of Charleston's buildings.

It has been known by more than a few names such as The Tavern on the Bluff's, Harris's Tavern, and Mrs. Coates Tavern by the Bay. In 1903, it became a "Whiskey Store" during an era when it was illegal to buy a drink, even if it was served in a teacup. Fronting as a barber shop through Prohibition, it sold liquor from a backroom. A latch door in the back of the shop led to an underground tunnel that once moved moonshine to speakeasies—then called "blind tigers."

The Blind Tiger Pub building on Broad Street has such an underground tunnel, which also can be entered through a latched door at the back of the building. Those wanting a drink would have to sneak one in one of the tunnel's many dark nooks. Whether the two tunnels connected is open to question. At this time, I must insert a bit of caution because like many stories from Charleston's past, you must measure its factuality with a grain of Carolina Gold. Following Repeal, The Tavern returned to legal status. It has been the nation's oldest Spirits store in continuous operation. Now that bit of information is as bona fide as its Bluffton Whiskey.

The original building is split into three different addresses. Due to law, spirits must be sold separately from wine and beer. The middle section, which sells wine and beer, is the most fascinating of the three. Its brick, front exterior has an arched double-door flanked by two arched windows, and directly above, a double-window second floor extension all painted in dark green. Inside, the current owners have preserved the shop's legacy by restoring its interior featuring its original hardwood flooring and brick walls with antique furnishings from around the world--a bookshelf from the Library of Congress and an artisan's working table from France. In one of the adjoining rooms is the mysterious latched-door leading to the underground. The third section of the building is unused--at one-time a gallery. Future plans are to open up the wall where the beer taps are presently and turn the unused section into a drinking space with a garden patio outside.

The Tavern specializes in local or rare spirits, like a five-grain bourbon made with a Carolina rice variety(Seashore Black Rye) once written off as extinct, and Carolina Gold; a black tea liqueur made from the only large-scale tea plantation in the U.S.(Charleston Tea Plantation); and a vodka made from a rye grain grown on South Carolina's Edisto Island. To acquaint you with the unfamiliar, the shop also offers weekly tastings.

The Tavern has been featured on Southern Charm, Moonshiners, History’s Most Haunted, and Atlas Obscura. With a multifaceted history and a singular focus, The Tavern at Rainbow Row stayed true to its reason for being and never stopped distributing booze. Now that makes for one happy sailor.

Unused space--future drinking space

Entrance to garden patio

 

Future garden patio

120 East Bay Street, Charleston, SC

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A One Of A KInd Architectural Wonder--Farmers' And Exchange Bank

East Bay Street, from the Old City Market to Broad Street, is one of the busiest pedestrian
thoroughfares in Charleston aside from Meeting and King Street. Its walkways are the commercial lifeline of the famous French Quarter. Tourists and locals on any given day flood the many eateries, galleries, and shops housed in the numerous old buildings overlooking this concrete river. Among its numerous architectural wonders stands a one of a kind. You no doubt have walked past it many times just throwing it a passing glance and not giving it a second thought. But, if you were to stop, take an inquisitive gaze at it for a few moments, you will gain another perspective. It is a surviving reminder of the beautifully diverse history that makes Charleston what it is today.

Located on the west side of East Bay Street near the Old Exchange and Provost Dungeon, this peculiar two-story masonry building, built out of brick and varying shades of brownstone--one a solemn tone from Connecticut and the other a soft hue from New Jersey, is exceptionally different. Architecturally designed in the most flamboyant of the nineteenth-century exotic revivals, its motif was a radical departure from the traditionally favored styled buildings of similar institutions.

Its main facade is dominated by three distinct but identical sections with muqarnas features. Its three first floor entrances are trimmed by a trefoil arch with intricately carved double doors featuring decorative iron work and topped by large, circular windows with an inlaid daisy pattern. The second-floor has three large multi-pane fixed windows with the upper circular portion edged in a Moorish inspired scalloped design. The roof line is lined with a double rowed horseshoe-shaped entablature and topped off with a sheet metal roof and a Spanish and Moorish style muqarnas dome. The rear wing has the conventional Classical Revival style. There are two chimneys in the rear. On the interior, there is pine board flooring and a paved vestibule leading to the main banking room. This opulent space is twenty-one feet wide and nearly fifty feet in length and features arcade walls, elaborate plaster ornamentation, and a coffered ceiling and skylight.

Farmers' and Exchange Bank was chartered on December 16, 1852. The design of the building was the work of architects Edward C. Jones and Francis D. Lee. Its construction began in 1853 with its completion in 1854. Their design is thought to have been influenced by illustrations from Washington Irving's Tales of the Alhambra, a book about his three-month stay at a Moorish palace in 1829. It was published around the time the building was constructed.

Alhambra Castle--you can see the similarities in architecture.

The Farmers' and Exchange Bank's denominations ranged from $5 - $100. Both the $5 and the $10 notes from this bank depicted scenes of the antebellum South. In the 1860's, the Federal bombardment of Charleston forced the bank to move to Columbia. The Civil War took a toll on the bank and in time, it closed. Overtime, the building was used as a telegraph office by Western Union. U.S. Senator Ernest "Fritz" Hollings once owned the building and used it for office space. The structure was considered for demolition in the early 1970s due to deterioration, but Charleston banker Hugh Lane Sr. contributed $50,000 toward its restoration. It was declared a National Historic Landmark on November 7, 1973.

In the 1990's, it became home for the Saracen restaurant and a second floor drinking establishment called Little Charlie's Bar. In time, the restaurant closed, but the bar remained. The bar was rumored to be a den of drugs and money-laundering and described as being "smoky, full of slutty college chicks and horny frat guys. A place where the bartenders played favorites with the beautiful people, the music was all over the map," and a few other things I will leave unmentioned. Charlie's Little Bar closed in 2005.

The Balish Family purchased the building in that same year. They owned restaurants in Savannah called The Olde Pink House and Garibaldi and for three decades, Charleston's Garibaldi Cafe at 49 S. Market Street. It was renowned for serving crispy flounder to tourists and locals alike. The restaurant closed after 33 years because its lease had expired, so they were looking for a new space to locate their restaurant. They were considering two locations--a vacant waterfront lot they owned on Concord Street beside Dockside Condominiums or the recently purchased iconic Farmers' and Exchange building.

They chose the iconic building and planned on calling it Farmers and Exchange Restaurant, which had a planned opening in late 2015. So far, it has not come to fruition and the building remains eerily quiet except for some spurious activity from time to time.

The Farmers' and Exchange building at 141 East Bay Street is one of the few surviving Moorish Revival structures in the United States, and Charleston has it.

Bay Street Biergarten--Bavarian Inspired And Southern Made Located On Historically Solemn Ground

Remaining skeleton of the Wilmington Depot.

The location of the Bay Street Biergarten historically was at one time called the Wilmington Railroad Depot which was on the Northeastern rail line at Chapel and Alexander Streets. During the evacuation of the Confederate Army from Charleston in 1865, the depot was the scene of a horrific tragedy. Filled with powder and explosives at the time of the exodus, women and children of Charleston rushed in to see what they could get. Some of the gun powder caught on fire and the building was blown up. In the explosion, 250 of the women and children were killed and wounded. The remaining ruins was reconstructed in the late 1800's.

With Sherman in control of the South Carolina rail line running into Branchville and Charleston by Wednesday, February 14, Beauregard ordered Hardee to complete an evacuation immediately before they lost the last railroad that connected Charleston with Florence to the north and to leave nothing for the Union army. Cannons were spiked, quartermaster’s stores were destroyed, and ironclads and ships were scuttled. Cotton storehouses filled with an estimated 6,000 bales waiting to be shipped were set on fire. Saturday morning, February 18, aware of burning cotton bales at one end of the depot, but unaware of the roomful of gunpowder stored next to the burning cotton, and the trail of gunpowder between the two, starving civilians entered the station and gathered what they could.

An I witness account by Lt. Moses Lipscomb Wood, of Company F, the 15th South Carolina Volunteer Infantry Regiment, "The Thicketty Rifles," recorded the event in his "War Record" as follows: "I was in Charleston on the night before and the morning it was evacuated, and was put in charge of a detail of about 75 men to load what cars (of the Northeastern Railroad) we could ahead of us. We had not been out of the depot long before the women and children rushed in to see what they could get. The depot was filled with powder and explosives and caught on fire and was blown up—causing the most pitiful sight I saw during the war. Women and children, about 250, were killed and wounded, and some were carried out by where [we] were in line on the streets, with their clothing burned off and badly mutilated."

Another account written by Pauline Dufort stated, "But our trials were not yet ended, for there came another terrible explosion--louder than any yet--the smoke of which darkened the sun as its hideous folds curled skyward. It was the Northeastern Railroad depot that had been blown up, and with it a number of persons who had gathered there in search of provisions. Some were killed outright and their mangled bodies and limbs were scattered and buried under the burning ruins."

The Richmond Dispatch, Friday, March 3, 1865 wrote, "The Charleston Courier of the morning of the 20th--its last Confederate issue--thus describes the horrors of the evacuation of the city (Charleston). The terrible scenes through which this community has passed since our last issue can only be conceived by those who witnessed the dreadful reality." This preserved printed account historically verifies the story connected to the solemn ground on which Bay Street Biergarten honorably resides today.

The day I visited the Bay Street Biergarten the plan was to spend the evening on their outdoor patio listening to the jams of local singer/songwriter Chelsea Summers. A late afternoon thunderstorm moved the party indoors. It was packed out with soccer enthusiasts decked out in the colors of their favorite teams watching the games on large screen TVs located throughout. Its flag-draped, wood-beamed, high ceilings gave it the feeling of spaciousness. Booths lined one wall while larger circular tables were located on a step-up area. The communal tables were scattered about in front of the main bar.

It has 24 beers on tap behind the bar, 60 taps throughout the building, all delivered by a state of the art tap table system. With the purchase of a preloaded RFID card, you can access a selection of flavors, information about the beer, how much you are pouring and your pouring history at the stationary iPads at each communal table and Bier Wall. The beer flows from a keg cooler in the back of the building and is pumped by a glycol cooling system through 156 feet of draft lines. To help you avoid the oversized head foam, you can download information on how to make the perfect pour off of their website.

Essential to the overall experience of enjoying a good craft beer is making the perfect pour. There is nothing more frustrating to a beer drinker than having to wait for an oversized head to dissipate, and not to leave unmentioned, it is less appealing. Creating the right amount of foam head adds to the overall presentation, but even more important than the aesthetics is the proper releasing of the beer's aromatics. It is an acquired skill first time patron's of the Bay Street Biergarten soon learn comes in handy when using its forward thinking communal tap tables--tables with self serving beer taps.

The communal tap tables do not need reservations--first come, first serve. A great setting for making new acquaintances, building new friendships and sharing food. It was enjoyable watching people pour their own beer and talk about what went wrong--return customers had a bit more experience. After the rain passed and towards the end of the night, we had a couple of shots at the bar on the large, outside brick patio--skillful and friendly bartenders.

Aside from having the most progressive technology the beer industry has to offer along with giving you the experience of pouring your own beer, the Bay Street Biergarten also has its own parking lot, which gets a big "cheers" from me. No searching for quarters to put in the meters or driving into parking garages and paying high fees.

Bay Street Biergarten is as close as you can get to an authentic Munich beer hall in the south with a goal to support Charleston’s local, ever-expanding brewing, distilling and farming communities. It offers Southern food with a flavor of Bavarian inspiration paired with the finest craft beers and quality socializing. It was fresh as the bay air coming in from the nearby port. It was a stout experience. And while you are there, take a moment of silence and after, raise your glass in honor of the lives that were lost in one of Charleston's little known and most horrific event.

Location:
549 East Bay St
Charleston, SC

Hours:
All Days 11am-2am

Superbly Different, Tastefully Done--An East Bay Street Cocktail Mixing Treasure

Discreetly tucked away in a quaint alley just beyond a black wrought iron fence, I had passed its intimate, bricked courtyard many times while walking the Venue Range in the French Quarter. No more than a passing curiosity over the years, an outing a week earlier included a brief, probing peek into its windows.

Back again and on the prowl for an untried place to have dinner, I was surveying the East Bay streetscape when the unimposing black and white sign marking its location caught my attention and rekindled my interest to take another look-see. Its name invoked thoughts of white tuxedo jackets, spat covered shoes, and Humphrey Bogart clutching a gimlet exclaiming, "Of all the gin joints, in all the towns, in all the world, she walks into mine."

By definition, a joint is an unsavory place. Add gin to it, and you have an unsavory place serving alcoholic concoctions. The establishment in question on East Bay Street is anything but sleazy and even Bogie would be proud to be seen there as would any respectable local or tourist. It is a little piece of classy, French Quarter real estate lined with a liquor bottle menagerie of rainbow intoxicants served in varying sizes of glassware on a curved bar complimented by an assortment of unconventional dishes at surprisingly cheap prices. Ironically, it is called The Gin Joint.

After gleaning the menu, it quickly became apparent this was not the place for a full dinner. The drink portion of the menu was sizably longer than the food portion, but it was an attention grabber, especially the section called the Bartender's Choice. The bar was full and the leather booths against the walls looked comfortable, but the outdoor courtyard furnished with three sets of black wrought iron tables and chairs under the lights and the trees was the perfect choice on this beautiful Charleston early evening.

The menu was divided into two sections: drinks and food. The drink section was divided into alcohol categories: Gin, Agave, Whiskey, Brandy, and Rum but no Vodka--it is a pre-Prohibition menu. Under the alcohols were house names of mixes containing that particular alcohol--the mixes change with the seasons and inspiration.

While all the listed drinks were seductively tempting, the Bartender's Choice was the perfect match for my "throw caution to the wind" mood. From a list of 15 flavors and taste sensations, I was instructed to pick two of my favorite passions. Based on my choices of strong and savory, the bartender skillfully created my surprise cocktail using local sources of bitters and citruses blended with a shot of spirited imagination. When my highly anticipated libation finally arrived, the server detailed the ingredients and the alcohols used. It was the proper drink and exactly what I was looking for. An added striking feature of my Bartender's Choice was the single chunk of ice submerged in my cocktail cut to the shape of the glass--a chip off the 300-pound ice blocks whittled down by Joe Raya and company. All drinks are $10 each.

As to the food, the categories were Provisions, Cheese, and Desserts. My food selection came from the Provisions. The Duck Meatball Sliders with Fennel, Apple Slaw, and a San Marzano tomato sauce for $12 were very Mediterranean and delightfully exquisite.

Other choices were a Chicken N Waffle Sandwich with a Red Pepper Jelly for $12, a Benton's Country Ham wrapped in a Grilled Cheese and Wow Wow sauce for $9, Pickled Shrimp with Lemon, Capers, Onions and Sour Dough for $8, and a Pad Thai Popcorn for $6. Informed popular house favorites included a Soft Pretzel covered with Sriracha Cheese Sauce and Bull's Bay Salt for $7 and Pork Buns for $12. Dessert choices included a Coca-Cola Cake for $10 and a Peanut Butter Chocolate bar for $8.

The Gin Joint has been selected as one of "the 21 Hottest Cocktail Bars Across the US" by Eater and Garden and Gun rated it as one of the "50 Best Southern bars." From my experience, I see no reason to question their knowledgeable evaluation. With its idyllic location on East Bay Street right in the heart of the French Quarter surrounded on all sides by the best of the best, its contribution to Charleston's sizzling bar scene in my estimates is second to none and its drink offerings top shelf. Because the food menu consists mainly of small dishes, you would be more likely to choose it as a place to share a quiet cocktail with a special someone before a dinner outing or a drop in for a comforting drink and dessert diversion from an afternoon of sightseeing. Superbly different, tastefully done. For me, it is no longer just a passing interest. It is a on going interest.