As medical marijuana dispensaries make their first appearance in the state, it’s worth remembering a time when prescription alcohol flowed in the cups of Marylanders.

The Prohibition years from 1920 to 1933 saw a glut of doctor-prescribed alcohol across the United States. None other than famously boozy Winston Churchill carried with him a doctor’s note that allowed him “a minimum” of 250 cubic centimeters of alcohol — around half a pint — following a car accident he suffered in New York.

To get the scrip, a thirsty patient need show symptoms of “anything that you could persuade a doctor you needed alcohol for,” said Francis O’Neill, senior reference librarian at the Maryland Historical Society. The doctor would then fill out a government-issued prescription form and the patient would have the prescription filled at a local pharmacy. Most patients were limited to just one pint per ten days. A Sun article reported that doctors who treated alcohol-dependent patients were directed to taper them off over the period of four weeks, after which point they would be legally “cured.”

Though most of the state was already dry by the time Prohibition went into effect, Maryland was the only state in the union that refused to pass a local law enforcing the 18th Amendment. The nickname “the Free State” became a reference to the willingness of Marylanders to flout the law. This was particularly true in immigrant-rich Baltimore, which O’Neill said was the “citadel of alcohol use.”

ctkacik@baltsun.com