Personal Narrative Essay: Underage Drinking

In addition to buying beer in returnable bottles, they purchased soda in returnable glass quart bottles. There were twelve bottles in a wooden crate. We often got Crystal Club, which was made in Scranton. Sometimes we got soda from Mid-Valley Bottling Company on Flynn Street in Jessup. We got an assortment of flavors including cola, cream, orange, root beer, and Birchola (birch beer). We also got ginger ale and Fifty-Fifty (lemon-lime). When we had company (usually relatives) the men would drink beer, but my parents would offer the ladies a highball. This usually consisted of a glass of ginger ale or Fifty-Fifty with a shot of Bankers Club whiskey, or whatever brand of whiskey that they had.

I recall one visit from Aunt Olga and Uncle Swede. They both drank beer. Somehow the topic of having an egg in your beer came up. My sister Melissa and I were intrigued. My parents also wanted

Some of my classmates used to have keg parties or keggers up the strippens. The strippens were places in the woods that were once strip mines.

Beginning in fifth grade, I participated in my school’s instrumental music program. This included concert and marching band. In 1982, during my senior year of high school, the Mid-Valley Spartan Band traveled to Busch Gardens in Williamsburg, Virginia. We participated in band competitions, and visited the amusement park.

The park is adjacent to a brewery, and tours are available to park patrons. At the conclusion of the brewery tour, there were complimentary samples of the beer. In Pennsylvania, the legal drinking age is 21, but at the time, the legal drinking age in Virginia was 18. We went on this trip about two weeks after my eighteenth birthday. Before I was allowed to have a sample, I was asked for identification. I showed them my valid Pennsylvania drivers’ license, and was allowed to have my first legal beer. I don’t remember which beer that I