TAVERNS --
LICENSED OR NOT

In the earliest days of the Pennsylvania frontier, licensed establishments didn't exist -- for that matter, neither did towns, or seats of government or Proprietary Manors (except as mere boundary lines on a survey map).  The frontier had yet to be civilized.

First came the mills, then the inns and yaugh houses, then the churches, then the taverns, then the villages, until finally, civilization demanded the services offered by courthouses, jails, constables, sheriffs, licenses and taxes.

As soon as the first courthouse was established in 1753, petitions were immediately proffered for licenses to keep public houses (taverns).  Even so, it wasn't until 1759 that Samuel Dupui obtained his own license to operate an area tavern.  Licenses, other than as a governmental means to securing additional revenue, were promoted with the notion that they would serve to maintain order, to minimize drunkenness, and avoid it on Sundays, if at all possible.

Nicholas Dupui's general store ledger offers only a single entry that points to such taverns in the 1750s, an entry in the account of John McDowell that merely states:  "To paid at ye tavern."  Dated to 14 August 1755, the tavern cited was quite clearly an as yet  unlicensed establishment. Yet honestly, the patrons didn't care.  Taverns were a tradition, and one always honored tradition.  As to the titillating implication often bandied about that many early American taverns were really brothels (sometimes termed disorderly houses), there is no evidence from Dupui's ledger that would support such a claim at the local level.