HISTORY OF LOMPOC TEMPERANCE MOVEMENT

In the fall of 1874 the Lompoc Valley Land Company founded the town of Lompoc, California. One of the founders, W. W. Broughton, was a teetotaler and had aspirations for making Lompoc a liquor-free town. In the 1870’s, the Temperance Movement was gaining momentum throughout the country and local governments allowed each community to decide their own laws regarding the manufacture and sale of ‘vinous, malt, spirituous or other intoxicating liquors.’ Exceptions were made for medicinal alcohol. And so it was decided that Lompoc would be a Temperance Colony, a place where alcohol was banned. But that didn’t stop everyone from drinking altogether. There were a faction of wets who were forced to consume alcohol in private. And the local Temperance League was always more than happy to relieve them of that liquor. In 1875 an unknown group of ax-wielding women stormed a drugstore known for selling liquor and destroyed all the alcohol on the shelves. In 1881, another establishment known for providing liquor was fire bombed unknown assailants. And the most famous instance of the town’s Temperance Spirit was in 1883 when the local Temperance League used ropes to pull down a building where liquor was being sold. As local rumor has it, the building was then dragged through town as an example to others of what might happen to those who thought to sell liquor.