Starting Tuesday, October 6, the bar at 120 River Street has a Happy Hour: Tuesday through Thursday, 4:00 to 7:00 PM, and Sunday, 2:00 to 4:00 PM, with specials on selected margaritas, sangria, domestic beers, and mixed drinks like the Tequila Sunrise.

The name is older than the custom.

Where the name came from

Shakespeare got there first, in a way. In Henry V, the king tells his lords to “omit no happy hour / That may give furth’rance to our expedition,” meaning a lucky moment to prepare a war. By the late 1800s Americans were using “Happy Hour” as the name of clubs, magazines, and, later, small movie houses. None of it involved a drink.

By 1913, the crew of the battleship USS Arkansas was calling its regular evening entertainments “happy hours”: boxing and wrestling, moving pictures, music, dancing on deck. In May 1914, Chicago’s Day Book reported that “the ‘Happy Hour’ on board the U.S.S. Arkansas is setting a record for contentment of the crew,” and that it was “really several hours set apart three nights a week for the entertainment of the crew.” By the end of the First World War, the custom had spread through the fleet. None of it involved alcohol, which the Navy had banned aboard its ships in 1914.

Happy hour reaches the bar

Prohibition, which began in 1920, gave the country the habit of a drink before dinner, and the “cocktail hour” grew out of that era. You’ll often read that speakeasy regulars already called it “happy hour.” We went looking and couldn’t find it in print.

The first printed use we can point to for cheap drinks is an ad in the North Hollywood Valley Times on June 1, 1951:

HAPPY HOUR — All Bar COCKTAILS…25c — 5 p.m. to 6 p.m.

In April 1959, The Saturday Evening Post ran “The Men Who Chase Missiles,” about Americans at remote missile-tracking stations, and mentioned in passing the men “who spend too much during ‘happy hour’ at the bar.” The magazine didn’t coin the phrase, but it put it in front of millions of readers.

The drinks

Nobody knows who invented the margarita, though plenty of bartenders and socialites have claimed it. Margarita is Spanish for “daisy,” and the Daisy is an old family of sours made with a spirit, citrus, and a sweet liqueur. American newspapers were mentioning a “Tequila Daisy” by 1936. The first recipe printed under the name “Margarita” ran in Esquire in December 1953.

Sangria takes its name from sangre, blood, for the color. It’s a wine punch with Spanish roots, and the Spanish Pavilion at the 1964–65 New York World’s Fair did a lot to make it popular in this country.

The Tequila Sunrise started just south of the border, at the Agua Caliente resort in Tijuana around 1930, as tequila, lime, crème de cassis or grenadine, and soda. The one most people know, with orange juice and grenadine, came from Bobby Lozoff and Billy Rice at the Trident in Sausalito, California, in the early 1970s. The Rolling Stones drank it on their 1972 American tour, and after that everyone did.

New Jersey has rules for happy hour. Bars here can lower prices, but they can’t offer two-for-one deals, bigger pours, or all-you-can-drink specials.

Happy Hour
When Tuesday – Thursday, 4:00 – 7:00 PM; Sunday, 2:00 – 4:00 PM
Where The bar and lounge, 120 River Street, Hackensack, NJ 07601
What Selected margaritas, sangria, domestic beers, and mixed drinks; ask your bartender for the list

Walk-ins welcome. Grab a stool and order something cold.

Please drink responsibly. You must be 21 or older to purchase alcoholic beverages.