Preston Hollow’s Booze Ban Keeps Away Undesirables
So I’m lifting my head briefly from the pool of mind-numbingly arcane Texas liquor law through which I’m swimming in the hopes of writing a somewhat coherent article about the history of booze sales in Preston Hollow to post this. In my research, which included a perusal of the Dallas Morning News‘ archives, I stumbled upon this article from 1940 detailing the exercise of the Town of Preston Hollow’s local option. Citizens of the newly incorporated municipality voted 97-49 to ban the sale of all alcohol. The article’s subhead sums it up thusly: “97 to 49 Vote Bans Intoxicants to Keep Undesirables Away.” Straightforward enough. And the lede (first paragraph for you non-jounalists) is classic: “Preston Hollow residents, many admitting they like a nip now and then, or an occasional bottle of beer voted out the sale of liuor in all forms in the county’s newest town, at a local option election Saturday.” In articles leading up the the town’s 1939 incorporation, I found many familiar names: Ira P. Deloache, R.B. Stichter, Albert G. Joyce, W.W. Caruth, Henry A. Northwest Highway, and Cornelius J. Dallas North Tollway. (I might have made up one or two of those, can’t be sure).
