London first got drunk on beer at five, then on red wine at seven, displaying a capacity for alcohol phenomenal in one so young. It was, most likely, kidney failure that killed him. By the time he died, aged only 40, London was a full-blown alcoholic. London always hated the taste of alcohol, and binge-drinking left him struggling for breath, but drink became a part of his life in his hard-scrabble youth.

Corral fame: London drank in the Dexter Saloon, a bar Earp owned in Nome, Alaska. Probably his best-known drinking acquaintance, though, was Wyatt Earp, of Gunfight at the O.K. London befriended the escape artist, Harry Houdini, who spent Thanksgiving at his ranch, and would go on to have an affair with his widow. He enjoyed cocktails, from Horse's Necks to Hot Toddies, and had his favourite cocktails premade for him in Oakland and shipped to his California ranch. Louis House, Joe Vigy's, Overland House, Haywards, San Leandro, Niles and the National Saloon, drinking with characters like Whisky Bob and French Frank.īut London drank everywhere - 'a cabaret in the Latin Quarter, a cafe in some obscure Italian village, a boozing ken in sailor-town.' Reporting on the Russo-Japanese war, he hung out at the Imperial Hotel Bar in Tokyo and Martin's Bar and the White Horse bar in Seoul in Des Moines, Iowa, a dry town, he sniffed out every blind pig in town.Īs a hobo, he drank watered-down chemist's alcohol with alki-stiffs in the Bonin islands he coped with the local firewater he itemises Bourbon, rye, Scotch, raw whisky, trade rum, absinthe, muscat, beer and wine in his book.Īs the best-selling author of his day, London's tastes changed. London spent his teens in Oakland saloons, among them the legendary Johnny Heinold's First and Last Chance Saloon, the St. Today it reads, at least in part, like a love letter to the old-time saloon. His alcoholic memoir, John Barleycorn, prompted sermons in pulpits, denunciations from liquor companies and eulogies from the temperance movement, and helped tip America towards Prohibition. Gold prospector, oyster poacher, rancher, amateur boxer, political activist and, most of all, writer, Jack London made his name with rugged tales of life on the American frontier. 100 years after his alcoholic memoir-cum-temperance tract, John Barleycorn, was published, we profile an all-round alpha male who helped tip America towards Prohibition.

Jack london alcoholic