Moonshine in popular culture

Moonshine (illicit distillation) is referenced in many works, including books, motion pictures, musical lyrics and television.

Main article: Moonshine

Moonshine window in the Arthur Jordan Piano Company storefront, Washington, D.C., ca. 1920

Literature

• In Patrick Dennis' fictional biography First Lady, the early years revolve around a moonshine called "Lohocla" (alcohol spelled backwards) produced by the father of protagonist Martha Dinwiddie Butterfield. As time passes in the story the concoction is less prominent, until the time of World War II, when the now-aged Martha Dinwiddie Butterfield donates her father's original formula for Lohocla to the United States government, which uses it in the atomic bombs dropped on Japan.
• In Rocket Boys (and the follow-on movie) by Homer H. Hickam Jr., moonshine plays a role in one of the home-made rocket fuels the protagonists create. In order to obtain it, they wind up getting drunk.^{[citation needed]}

Movies

• In the movie Stalag 17, featuring William Holden as prisoner of war Sgt. Sefton, Sefton's still is one of his more "profitable" ventures. Of its product, made from potato peels and a few strings from Red Cross packages, he says the house "only guarantees you won't go blind."

• The 1958 movie Thunder Road starred Robert Mitchum as a moonshine runner who takes risks driving his family's product through the hills of Tennessee for delivery in Memphis.

• The 1963 film The Great Escape is about an escape by Allied prisoners of war from a German POW camp during World War II. The two principal characters were U.S. Army Air Force Captain Virgil Hilts "The Cooler King," played by Steve McQueen and British Royal Air Force Flight Lieutenant Bob Hendley DFC "The Scrounger", played by James Garner. The two make moonshine in celebration of the 4th of July. On that day while passing out their potent concoction to the detainees, German guards discover the tunnel -- nicknamed "Tom" -- being dug by these two and the other prisoners.

• Moonshine was central to the plots in the 1973 Burt Reynolds films White Lightning and its sequel Gator.

• The film Moonrunners (1975) is a fictionalized account of the real-life experiences and stories of moonshiner Jerry Rushing. The TV series The Dukes of Hazzard was a 1979 spin off of the Hollywood film, using many of the same characters.

• In the 1977 film Greased Lightning stars Richard Pryor as Wendell Scott, the first African-American stock car racing champion in the United States. The film is loosely based on Scott's true life story. As a taxi cab driver in post-World War II, Scott had learned the skill of car racing by transporting illegal moonshine in the backwoods of Virginia.

• The Hungarian film Hukkle (Hiccups) is a study of a rural community where the regular distribution of moonshine is suddenly responsible for a series of mystery deaths when the rebellious women of the town bump off their more Chauvinist menfolk with select bottles tinctured with lily of the valley root.

• In the John Wayne films True Grit and Rooster Cogburn, Wayne's character Ruben J. "Rooster" Cogburn is a heavy-drinking United States Marshal who refers to his favorite moonshine as "genuine, double-rectified busthead". However, he never buys his moonshine, instead confiscating it from other drunks for his own consumption.

• The film The People Vs. Larry Flynt depicts Flynt and his brother Jimmy selling moonshine as children.

• The film Walking Tall depicts Sherriff Buford Pusser, who combats, among other things, illegal moonshine distilleries in McNairy County.

Music

• Moonshine appears in a number of artists' songs, like Bob Dylan, James Taylor, Van Morrison, John Denver, Ol' Dirty Bastard, Steve Earle, Jimmy Buffett, Akon, Jamie T, and Hank Williams Jr. as well as Hank Williams III. Dolly Parton sang a song called "Daddy's Moonshine Still". American country-roots singer/songwriter Gillian Welch released a moonshiner's dying lament, "Tear My Stillhouse Down". Hank Williams III sang "A Moonshiner's Life", paying homage to one man by name.

• George Jones' 1959 chart-topping song "White Lightning" tells the story of a North Carolina moonshiner. "Well in North Carolina, way back in the hills, lived my ol' pappy and he had him a still. He brewed white lightning 'til the sun went down. Then, he'd fill him a jug and he'd pass it around. Mighty mighty pleasin', pappy's corn squeezin'."

• Robert Mitchum recorded a song in 1958 titled "The Ballad of Thunder Road," in which a moonshiner and his son run the stuff in a truck and the "revenuers" never catch him. At the end the son goes too fast--"He left the road at ninety," says one line. The last line of the chorus goes, "The Law they never got him 'cause the Devil got him first!"

• Copper Kettle is a witty song about moonshine performed by artists such as Joan Baez and Bob Dylan.

• Legendary funk band Parliament, led by George Clinton, recorded a song called "Moonshine Heather (Taking Care of Business)", a funky mid-tempo song about a mother who must sell moonshine to support her kids.

• Black metal band Venom praise the beverage in a song by the same name, found in their album Possessed.

• Covington, Georgia rapper Boondox recorded a song titled "Sippin on down", about making and consuming moonshine.

• Hoyt Axton's No No Song describes progressive attempts to sell drugs and Tennessean moonshine to a recovered addict who refuses it all. Ringo Starr's cover of this song was a number-one hit in Canada.

• The bluegrass song "Rocky Top" (Univ. of Tennessee's fight song) speaks of strangers who went looking for a moonshine still and never returned, as well as locals who "get their corn from a jar" because the ground is too rocky to actually grow corn.

• In the song "Ready or Not" sung by The Fugees, there is a reference to drinking moonshine.

Television

• Granny from the 1960s television series The Beverly Hillbillies runs a moonshine still by the Clampett family swimming pool (also referred to as the "cement pond") and refers to the product as rheumatism medicine and as an ingredient in her "spring tonic" and claims to drink only a thimbleful at a time. Several subplots of the show's episodes focused on a humorous situation involving Granny's liquor. Every cast member of The Beverly Hillbillies was seen drinking moonshine at one point in time during the show's history. It was also used occasionally to power the family truck, though Uncle Jed felt it was hard on the engine, (also referring it as 'liquid dynamite'). Some colorful descriptions of Granny's moonshine are Possum Ridge Paralyzer and Tennessee Tranquilizer.

• The Waltons featured the elderly spinster Baldwin sisters, who, in memory of their dear departed father, keep alive the knowledge of "The Recipe." Unbenownst to them, their father was a bootlegger, and the concoction they lovingly produce from "The Recipe" is in fact moonshine whiskey.

• In the television series M*A*S*H, the characters Hawkeye Pierce and Trapper John McIntyre, later replaced by B. J. Hunnicutt, made moonshine (which they usually referred to as gin) in a make-shift distillery in their tent.

• The protagonists of the series The Dukes of Hazzard are depicted as having run a still either presently or in the past, depending upon the adaptation.

• In the Sanford episode "In the Still of the Night", Calvin (Dennis Burkley) sets up a still in Fred Sanford's kitchen, which he uses to make his special home brew. Sanford is outraged until he has a taste of the liquor, then becomes opportunistic and gains keen ambitions to sell the formula to a big time distiller for a huge sum of money. Unfortunately his plans and dreams fall through once it becomes revealed that the moonshine liquor causes temporary baldness.

• A 4th season episode^[which?] of Emergency! included a major plot thread about a minor epidemic of psychotic behavior in alcoholics, which was ultimately traced to lead poisoning from a moonshine still. By the end of the episode, Engine Co. 51 was putting out a fire that destroyed that very distillery (and the house where it was located).

• In the 2nd season of The Unit it showed a former member of The Unit brewing Moonshine for other members. It was then showed in a number of episodes the Unit members drinking Moonshine from mason jars.

• In an episode of It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia Frank Reynolds is shown pouring large amounts of moonshine in a secret micro-brew he and Mac were making. To which Mac tells Franks "Thats enough moonshine Frank, We don't want people to go blind." , However Frank replies to Mac's dismay, "You can never have enough moonshine." Mac than scolds Frank for wanting to add Anti-Freeze to the Micro-brew claiming,"We don't want to kill people Frank, I don't think you're getting this."

• Early Cuyler of Squidbillies is said to be a frequent brewer of moonshine.

• In The Simpsons, Homer becomes friends of moonshiners, and he becomes an official taste tester, due to the ability that he drinks a lot and can taste alcohol very well.

• In an episode of Oz, the HBO drama series based in a jail, Beecher is given moonshine by a fellow bunkmate.

Video games

• In the game Redneck Rampage, moonshine was used as a power-up that increased fighting ability.
• In an expansion for the 2008 game of the year Fallout 3. There was a quest to collect moon shine for a character.
• In Grand Theft Auto Vice City and Grand Theft Auto Vice City Stories, a fictional booze called Boomshine is similar to Moonshine.
• In BioShock, alcohol entitled "Moonshine" can be found in various locations and may be ingested to increase one's Health status at the expense of lowering a player's Eve.
• In Red Dead Redemption Moonshine can be bought and consumed to refill the player's Dead eye meter.
• In Alan Wake, the protagonist has a out of body experience after drinking Moonshine.

References

Harkins, Anthony. Hillbilly: A Cultural History of an American Icon. Oxford University Press, USA (2005).