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ORAL HISTORY

Larry Morris

Tommy Lancaster opened his namesake restaurant in New Albany, Indiana, in 1953. A blue-collar town, New Albany has been home to mill workers, construction crews, and many who commuted to jobs across the river in Louisville. When folks finished a long day at work, a cold beer was waiting for them at their neighborhood watering hole. Larry Morris was one of those people. With a job across the river, Larry would belly up to the bar at Tommy Lancaster’s to have a drink and a bite to eat, and to cash his paycheck. One day Tommy, who knew that Larry came from a long line of bartenders, asked him if he wanted a job. Larry started mixing drinks at Tommy Lancaster’s in 1960, when Martinis were sixty-cents, beer was a quarter, and women weren’t allowed to sit at the bar. After forty-three years of making cocktails and pouring beer, Larry finally retired in 2003. But he didn’t stay away for long. In 2007 he was back, selling five-dollar Martinis and three-dollar beers in part of what is today considered the Greater Louisville Metropolitan Area.