TSOTM Aug 2025: Gin Bottle Riot

It commemorates the gin bottle riot of August 1964, which took place in the Chicago suburb of Dixmoor, after a liquor store owner was accused of beating a Black woman, Blondella Woods, who allegedly attempted to shoplift a bottle of gin. 150 local residents held a demonstration outside of the shop, and when the shop owner was eventually arrested by police, the crowd began rocking the car. Clashes erupted between police firing teargas, and the local community throwing rocks. The liquor store was looted, and nearby buildings set on fire. One civil rights leader, Syd Finlay of the National Association for the Advancement of Coloured People called for calm at a church meeting: "We have been turning the other cheek in the past. Can't we turn the other cheek one more time?" According to a Chicago Tribune reporter, the crowd responded with loud shouts of "No!" and Finlay sat down. The disturbances lasted for three days, until eventually dying down after dozens of people had been wounded and arrested by police. The shop owner was eventually acquitted of assault, while Woods was convicted for shoplifting.

This month's design is by Chris W. Jany and symbolically features a gin bottle from the fictional Blondella Woods Justice Distillery. It represents the fight against structural, everyday racism in the United States, which remains widespread and often deadly even more than 60 years later.