Apparently, a Hot Time in the Old (West) Town
Archeologists digging at the site of a black-owned saloon in a historic Old West mining town have unearthed a 130-year-old bottle of hot sauce.
The oldest style of Tabasco bottle known to exist was reconstructed from 21 shards excavated from beneath the site of the Boston Saloon of Virginia City, Nev., about 20 miles southeast of Reno.
The bottle suggests that the saloon, which was owned by a black man from Massachusetts and catered to blacks and whites from 1864 to 1875, was among the first eateries to introduce the sauce.
Edmund McIlhenny, a New Orleans banker, began blending aged red peppers, salt and vinegar to create the Tabasco brand pepper sauce in 1868 on Avery Island, La.
McIlhenny Co. officials say the sauce maker first used old cologne bottles to hold the sauce.
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