It’s Daniel Boone’s Birthday. Born in 1734, the famed frontiersman and explorer has long been a vital part of American folklore. What you might not know is that, in addition to tramping around the wilds of Kentucky and vistas westward, he also owned and operated one of Kentucky’s first taverns. This was when the area was deep wilderness, and there Daniel was, slinging rum and corn whiskey to frontiersmen and natives alike. When he was on the trail, Dan always carried a large flask of Monongahela, a type of high-proof corn liquor, and if some of his stories are to be believed, he used it to drive away the cold, rejoice his heart, treat wounds, and one one occasion, to get his Shawnee captors falling-down drunk so he could make good his escape. Fun fact: Daniel was known far and wide for his “Beef and Barrel” barbecues, wherein members of the local tribes and the Scotch-Irish settlers would socialize over whole-roasted cattle and barrels of rum or whiskey. What’d you’d call frontier-style networking.
