What Is The Origin Of (179)?…
A Mickey Finn
One of the more lamentable perils of drinking in a bar is someone slipping you a Mickey Finn. By this we mean someone has put a substance, be it another liquid or some form of powder, into your drink with the intention of making you insensible or more pliable to their wishes.
But who or what was Mickey Finn?
Well for once in our etymological enquiries there seems good reason to believe that there was a real Mickey Finn – it is a common Irish name, after all – and that the Mickey in question ran between 1896 and 1903 the Lone Star and Palm Garden in what was known as Whiskey Row on Chicago’s State and Harrison streets. It seems that in 1898 Finn met a mysterious travelling salesman who, as well as supplying heroin and cocaine, had some unusual brown bottles filled with a liquid and white powdery chemical. Quite what they were no one ever determined but Finn purchased a job lot of them and they fuelled an unusual and lucrative crime spree.
As a bartender Finn was in a prime position to dispense the contents of one of these bottles into what he called his “special drink”. Whatever was in the liquid when mixed with raw alcohol, was powerful enough to put the unwitting toper into a state of unconsciousness. Finn would then relieve them of their valuables and dump them out in the street where, eventually, they would recover consciousness and wonder what on earth had happened to them.
Alas, all good things must come to an end. Persistent reports of dopings at Finn’s gaff led the police to take a closer look at what was going on. By this time, in late 1903, it had earned the reputation as being one of the worst dens in the south side levee. A damning report was submitted by an Inspector Lavin to his Chief O’Neill and acting upon their recommendation, the Mayor, Carter Harrison, issued an order on 16th December 1903 for the forcible closure of the Lone Star. Shortly afterwards, Finn left town.
But it seems that the habit of doping drink or foodstuffs disappeared from Chicago with Finn’s departure. It has been suggested that the enterprising Finn sold the remainder of his stock of his knockout drops to other publicans in the area.
The custom, if we can term it thus, also was a feature of the restaurant trade as this report from The Washington Post in June 1918 shows. One hundred waiters were up before the magistrate for using coercive techniques to ensure that customers gave tips. It goes on “Mr Hoyne had a report that waiters used a certain powder in the dishes of known opponents to the system. The powders, according to Mr Hoyne, produced nausea and were known as Mickey Finns. It is thought that many cases of supposed ptomaine poisoning reported after meals in downtown cafes and hotels may have been caused by the Mickey Finns.”
In this case, the Mickey Finn was a tartar emetic but the report is probably first recorded usage of our phrase.
The modern usage reflects the same type of behaviour that brought Finn his notoriety and there is no need to consider the author Ernest Jarrold who wrote in the 1880s a series of stories published in the newspapers featuring Mickey Finn. Although these predate our bartender, the name was sufficiently common amongst the irish communities for it to be used without any special connotation.
No, Mickey Finn of the Lone Star Saloon is yer man.
