The history of The Elbow Room bar was that it was a small bar located in Hazleton, Pennsylvania. behind the old Hazle Drug store. This was a bar room that was mainly for Anthracite Coal Miners at that time. It was small enough to hold probably about 10 people. The Coal Miners would usually drink at this bar after their shift in the mines. The bar sold mainly cold beer and shots of whiskey. The miners would usually have “boilermakers”, which was a shot glass placed inside there mug of beer, then downed in one or two gulps. Also in those days of yore there was no need for a bathroom. The brass pipes mounted above those tile gutters in the floors of the old taprooms weren’t for resting feet. They were for miners who stopped at the bar after a 12-14 hour shift. Their ritual included lining up and drinking 8 to 10 consecutive shots of whiskey so the alcohol vapors would loosen the coal dust from their lungs.
Then they would cough up the darkened phlegm into the pitched trough until their chests cleared. The bartender would turn the valve at one end of the pipe so water would flush the black lung demon into a drain at the other end.
The block in which the Elbow Room was located was erected in about 1866. I use to take my father there a few times and drink a beer or two with him there. Now both are gone. The Elbow room was demolished in 2001. A new Hazle Drug building that is state of the Art for pharmacies is now located there.
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