LI's naughty days of Prohibition now for tourists
Acting out a scene from the days of Prohibition, Kathleen Rose, of Rocky Point, pours liquor from a canning jar into a tea cup for Alexandra Salvatore, of Blue Point, at Finnegan's Restaurant and Tap Room in Huntington. The setup is part of a new North Shore tourism campaign focusing on 17 spots to get a drink when alcohol sales were federally prohibited. (June 28, 2011) Credit: Newsday / Karen Wiles Stabile
When Andrew Finnegan was running things, patrons who wanted an alcoholic beverage at Finnegan's, his Huntington Village establishment, needed to recite a code word. Then they would be admitted to a tiny room, apart from the restaurant.
That was during the Roaring '20s, when Finnegan's -- now a popular restaurant and tavern on Wall Street -- was a speakeasy.
Finnegan's is among the sites on Long Island, former speakeasies or Jazz Age mansions that are going to be featured by the North Shore Promotion Alliance, a nonprofit tourism organization, as part of a campaign, beginning Thursday, to build tourism here.
The campaign comes ahead of a new Ken Burns PBS documentary slated for the fall, "Prohibition," and a remake of the 1974 movie "The Great Gatsby," scheduled for release in 2012. On Wednesday the alliance will launch a website, longislandher itagetrail.com, listing self-drive itineraries through 17 North Shore communities, including Huntington.
The alliance will run radio, newspaper and Internet ads about the campaign, "Long Island's Prohibition Secrets Revealed and Joe Sent Me." Many restaurants and bars in the communities will sport a "Joe Sent Me" decal on their doors. Patrons mentioning the code will be given a "Joe Sent Me" menu.
"The purpose of all this is to bring people to the North Shore," said Gloria Rocchio, the alliance's president. "Long Island is not just linear. There's width to it too. But it's not a pub crawl," Rocchio said.
Andrew Finnegan opened his place in 1912. Originally there were two front doors, one with a cigar and tobacco insignia on it, and the other closed -- unless you knew the password, said manager Tom Forte. Finnegan's is owned by the Lessing family of caterers.
Andrew Finnegan's son, Bill, tended bar at Finnegan's for years, finally retiring in the mid-1970s, Forte said. "He was probably the oldest bartender on Long Island," Forte said. "People would come and listen to his stories. You never get tired of this place."
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