The Martini: A Somewhat Factual History

Round 2: The Effects of Vodka, Vegas and Marilyn’s Cleavage

Article By: Mike Hamer

Following Prohibition, the gin and vermouth martini still hung around, maintaining a relatively low profile, though it had its share of high-profile enthusiasts. W.C. Fields, Hemingway, Fitzgerald, Dorothy Parker, H.L. Mencken, FDR, among others, all included the martini on their short list of favored drinks. But, for all intents and purposes the martini truly came into being during the late ‘50s to early ‘60s when Vegas, Hollywood, Madison Avenue, and the Bondian-Brat Pack-ideal got hold of it. The war was over. America was flush, and there was Dean and Sammy, Bogie and Bacall, Sinatra and Marilyn’s cleavage -- smooth, sophisticated and hip. Suddenly the martini was the handsdown coolest and sexiest drink in the bar. Even the martini glassware was sexy. Long-stemmed, wide-hipped, shapely cup, like a gorgeous woman in a strapless evening gown. Better still, a drunken gorgeous woman in a strapless evening gown. The possibilities!

As vital, if not more so, to its burgeoning popularity too was the fact that the lounge martini was being poured with vodka, a new deviation broadly welcomed for its palatable taste, diplomacy with a wider variety of mixers, and, some would say, gentler after effects. It helped too that after a hard day of spying and shagging 007 unwound with a good, ripping vodka martini. From this point forward, the drink would never be the same.

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