Loading ...What Is A Dive Bar?
Posted by Foobooz on February 16th, 2007
Joe Sixpack tackles the question of what is a dive.
The question: What is a dive bar?
You’ve got Noah Webster, who defines it as “a shabby and disreputable establishment.”
There’s Wikipedia, which refers to a “dated or rundown appearance and atmosphere.”
And Word-Detective.Com says the name goes back to the 19th century, when many disreputable joints were located below street level. An adventurous evening out literally meant “diving into a subterranean world of bad booze and even worse company.”
OK, it’s sounding pretty negative.
But when you talk to beer drinkers, you find they have a warm feeling for a favorite dive. Several online search sites, for example, run “best dive bar” polls, and readers describe them in the kind of glowing terms that a tavern owner usually clips out and pastes onto the wall.
Want a comfy bar? Just dive right in [Joe Sixpack, Daily News]
Related Tags: Bob-&-Barbaras, Dirty-Franks, Locust-Bar, Mermaid-Inn, The-Dive
