The rise and fall of ‘a long time between drinks’

“Mr. Edison’s phonograph preserves a conversation for 100 years. But conversations can be preserved that long without a phonograph. For instance, there is the celebrated conversation between the Governor of North Carolina and the Governor of South Carolina….”

— From Daily Alta California, Dec. 26, 1887 (via Louisville Courier-Journal)

How many people today would recognize this once world-famous expression, much less any of its numerous origin stories?  

Not many, the Google Ngram Viewer suggests. 

 

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