American Prohibition

American Prohibition marks a period of abrupt change in the novel’s social and commercial life: saloons close, alcohol returns through bootlegging, and even a dinner party becomes a question of legal uncertainty and appearances. Its significance is sharpened by the contrast with the reservation, where restrictions on liquor operate alongside controls on Indigenous people’s movement and access to resources.

Closures, Reopenings, and the Red Mill

For a time, the saloons close. Rose Gordon Burbank buys a player piano from one of them for ten dollars, although it had cost two thousand dollars. The bargain carries the effects of closure into the life of The Inn / Red Mill, where Rose has made a livelihood after the fortunes of other Beech businesses faltered.

The saloons later reopen cautiously under bootleggers who drive Hudson automobiles down from Canada. Their traffic belongs to a changed landscape of faster cars and new highways, and the bootleggers’ night journeys become part of local life. The novel presents prohibition not as a settled absence of alcohol but as a shift in who sells it and how it reaches customers.

The Red Mill’s business adapts to that shifting world. Herndon visitors arrive in expensive cars to eat chicken, steak, biscuits, and salad; afterwards, they can dance to the player piano. The instrument Rose acquired cheaply after the saloon closures thus becomes part of the establishment’s renewed social life. Its tunes include old wartime songs as well as newer popular music, placing commercial recovery beside memories the patrons would rather leave behind.

Law and Social Appearance

At a later gathering, two cars bring a party from Herndon to the Burbank home. Rose seats the visitors, then tells George Burbank that they have brought wine. She is unsure what the new law permits and worries that the scene might look improper if someone arrived. Her concern is as much about appearances as about the law itself: the presence of wine makes a private gathering seem potentially exposed to public scrutiny.

George offers to go in and speak to the guests, but Rose declines and says she will handle the matter another time. Her response shows the law entering domestic and social relations without resolving them into a clear account of what is permitted. The episode also contrasts the noisy visitors’ easy possession of wine with Rose’s caution about how their behavior might be judged.

A Separate Regime on the Reservation

The novel sets this uncertainty beside a distinct system of liquor control imposed on Indigenous people on the reservation. The rules prohibit both the sale and consumption of liquor, and the Indian agent sometimes enforces them when officials from the Department of the Interior are expected. The stated justification rests on a racial stereotype about Indigenous people and alcohol; the rule is part of an administrative regime imposed on people already displaced from their lands.

That regime extends beyond liquor. Leaving the reservation requires a permit, granted only for a pressing reason, while firearms are forbidden and meat is distributed through the government store. The restrictions make the difference between the two contexts consequential: bootlegging supplies a route around alcohol closures for other customers, while reservation rules govern Indigenous people’s movement and daily provisions as well as drinking. The novel does not treat these controls as interchangeable forms of prohibition.

Prohibition in a Changing Landscape

The social effects of prohibition unfold amid wartime loss, economic change, and the arrival of automobiles. As saloons close and later return under bootleggers, Beech’s old businesses disappear or change hands, and The Inn / Red Mill becomes a stop for travelers and wealthy visitors from Herndon. In this account, American Prohibition is one part of a broader transformation in local life, not an isolated legal episode.

The contrast with reservation restrictions gives that transformation a sharper political edge. One system of alcohol control is circumvented by bootleggers and absorbed into commercial nightlife; the other is enforced against a displaced population whose travel is already subject to permits. By placing these different experiences of regulation near one another, the novel shows that a rule’s reach depends on who is governed by it and what other powers accompany it.