“Please come, say hello, and get breathed on,” read the email. “New Year’s Eve is typically slower than an average Saturday, for whatever that is worth. Everyone who goes out is spending $150 on an open bar somewhere, and we pick up the scraps.”

The message came from Rafe Bartholomew, an editor at the sports website Grantland who’s writing a book about McSorley’s Old Ale House, to be published by Little, Brown in 2014. Mr. Bartholomew (who is a childhood friend of the Transom’s) didn’t come by the assignment by chance. His father, Geoff Bartholomew, has worked behind the stick at the saloon for the better part of 40 years, and Mr. Bartholomew the younger takes a shift slinging beers from time to time. McSorley’s is a fine bar to have grown up around, of course, if you want to write a book about the experience. Read More