My Netflix Picks: Prohibition

I'm a sucker for documentaries. I love learning, especially about history, but don't have time to read in depth about topics. We live in a Cliff Notes society and a Netflix documentary fills that bill for me.

I had seen Ken Burns' Prohibition on Netflix for a long time. The 2011 PBS three part documentary dives deeper into the history of that fifteen year period when the manufacture and sale of alcoholic beverages was outlawed by the 18th Amendment to the Constitution and later repealed by the 21st Amendment.

Having seen several of Burns' other films - Baseball, The War, The Civil War - I knew I was in for a solid watch and I wasn't disappointed.

The backstory of prohibition dates back to the 1830's and the build up to the nationwide ban on booze took some 80 years. Trying to wrap my brain around it 99 years after alcohol was banned was fascinating.

Can you imagine, in the volatile social media society in which we live, a movement getting enough traction to actually pass a constitutional amendment that banned alcohol? It couldn't ever happen now, but even thinking about how it did is still mind blowing.

I highly recommend watching it on cold day binge.

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