Lifestyle: Event
Moxie beverage was once the most popular soda product in the United States. It is also a word that we use to show strength, courage , energy and balls. I was living at the time in the Boston area, late 70’s and went food shopping mostly at the local Star Market. Walking down the aisles in the beverage area I noticed the distinct orange can of the soda called Moxie. It was a new brand for me but as I became familiar with the beverage discovered it had a long history.
A six-pack made it into the shopping cart and took the new elixir to my abode. Grabbed a tray of ice, filled up a glass with Moxie, chilled it for a few minutes and drank away. Moxie was unlike any soda I ever drank. Better than Coke, ginger ale, cream soda or any other pretenders to the soda throne. I was not a connoisseur of soda but did have favorites. Dr. Brown’s cream soda, A and W root beer, White Rock ginger ale always hit the spot. I was partial to Tom’s white birch beer back in boy scout camp but Moxie was clearly the top of the heap.
I passed on the knowledge of my new discovery of Moxie to some of my Boston friends but clearly they did not get the distinct flavor profile. To them it was just another soda , nothing but a beverage to drink . I was disappointed in their reaction but was determined to win the favor of friends to this distinct beverage. When I travelled back to New York from Boston , I brought a six-pack of Moxie with me. As Moxie is a regional drink , my New York cronies were not aware of the magic of Moxie. At a gathering of sorts I broke out the Moxie , filled up some glasses with ice and waited for any reaction from the jaded New Yorker’s.
The crowd of sophisticates started to foam at the mouth , grabbed at the few remaining cans of Moxie and bordered on mass hysteria. ” Where did you get this stuff, ?” “We need more, ” and other cries of desperation from the new-found Moxie fanatics.
I explained to them how I scored Moxie in a local Boston market. The drool was coming out of their collective mouths and demanded I bring back more Moxie next time I made it back to New York. Then someone came up with a better plan. They would drive up to Boston and load up the car with cases of Moxie. Cooler heads prevailed so a plan was made that in a month the boys would come up to visit and we would plunge Star Market of all available cases of Moxie.
So soon enough being people of action, the New York crew came up to the wilds of Boston , and I took them to the Star Market in the Porter Square area of Cambridge.
We cleaned out the shelves of Moxie and hightailed it back to New York. This was serious trip, no friendly let’s hang out and have fun. As being the organiser of the Moxie run, I went back to New York with them, protecting the stash.
First stop was at Robert Brook’s house in Westchester county so we could take a break and inventory the wares. All told we grabbed about 72 cans which was a paltry number for what we had planned but had to make due.
Next stop was Long Island City , Queens, the home of Nat Zimmerman where the exclusive party was to be held. This was an invite only gig , so the cans of Moxie could be properly doled out. The plan was fool-proof. In the living room were 6 oz. paper cups with no ice. You could put ice in your cup if were so inclined. However, each Moxie party person would only receive one paper cup of Moxie. If you wanted more , you needed to draw a random number from a hat to score another hit.
You could not buy any more Moxie as this was a party of the people, a true socialist event. The preparations were in place, the crowd started to come and as expected , each Moxie participant were ecstatic.
After the party we soon came to the conclusion , this event could never be replicated, it was in a once in a lifetime occurrence. The memories will always be with us alone with the one photo taken at Robert Brook’s house with yours truly and Rob displaying some of elusive nectar.
Keep smoking
