"All Aboard For Peters’ Restaurant"

 

From about 1873 to 1890, George Peters operated a restaurant and billiard parlor in the 600 block of Water Street in downtown Sandusky, Ohio (probably where the empty lot on the 100 block of East Water Street is today). He stated in an advertisement in the 1888 Sandusky City Directory that “meals were served to order at all hours of the day or night.”  Wine and beer were served in the saloon, and there was a private parlor for ladies. Women were allowed to patronize the business, but they weren't allowed to work there! 

The Sandusky city ordinances of the time prohibited women from working in a business that served alcohol unless they were the wife or daughter of the owner.

And if a woman did happen to work in a saloon, young men (under 21) were not allowed to engage in conversation with her, to help preserve "order" in the community. Rules were different in those days.

George Peters was a native of Germany. During the Civil War he served as a private in Company B of the 145^th Ohio Volunteer Infantry. In the early part of the twentieth century, he moved to Norwalk, Ohio. After his death in 1909, he was laid to rest in Sandusky’s Oakland Cemetery.