The Detroit-Based Origins Of The Last Word Cocktail
NEWS
By ILENE V. SMITH
There has been some debate over the origins of the Last Word cocktail, with places like Seattle claiming it as their own. However, the drink comes from another city: Detroit.
While the drink became popular in Seattle in the early 2000s, bartender Murray Stenson acknowledged the recipe came from a book of pre-prohibition recipes, "Bottoms Up."
The book said the cocktail was "introduced" to the city by a man named Frank Fogarty in the 1920s, but the recipe was also credited to the Detroit Athletic Club (DAC).
The cocktail was discovered on a 1916 club dinner menu. DAC's news magazine also reported that Fogarty, a minstrel performer, had come to perform his show at the club.
The club's food and beverage director told the Detroit Free Press that these two pieces of evidence bolster the claim that it was created at the DAC before Fogarty's arrival.
Although the evidence suggests the drink predates Fogarty's introduction to it, he is still widely credited with having invented the cocktail.
