Shot glass

A shot glass is a small glass designed to hold or measure spirits or liquor, which is either drunk straight from the glass ("a shot") or poured into a cocktail. A "shot" of liquor is not the same as a "shooter".

Shot glasses decorated with a wide variety of toasts, advertisements and humorous pictures are popular souvenirs and collectibles.

Name origin

The Oxford English Dictionary's first citation for the term "shot glass" is in The New York Times during the 1940s, but the earliest known written reference was in a 1913 book by Dr. Jehu Z. Powell, A History of Cass County Indiana from its Earliest Settlement to the Present Time [Lewis Publishing Company, 1913].

On page 655 Dr. Powell recounts an incident c. 1857 in the small town of New Waverly, Indiana, occasioned by a local man attempting to open a saloon against fierce local temperance opposition. The initial stock was a barrel of whiskey, which had arrived by train and was sitting on the open freight platform awaiting delivery to the would-be barkeeper. A local man who was an ardent temperance supporter fired his rifle from an upper floor window in his house and shot a hole in the barrel, draining it of its contents. "The remedy was effectual, and the saloon was not opened, and ever after, when the boys wanted a drink they would ask for a 'shot of redeye'".