Calling the Embalmer
A popular figure of the 1920s was the man (or woman) from whom alcohol, officially illegal, could be obtained. Bootlegger, itself a slang term of indefinite origin, was one reference to them. Embalmer was another, and was not necessarily a negative aspersion on the product being provided, since being embalmed was slang for being intoxicated. H. L. Mencken coined the term booticians for the women bootleggers who sold illicit alcohol to patrons at beauty parlors. Women customers were boozettes, men were boozehounds.
Female bootleggers were also known as snake charmers, who delivered their hooch (liquor), to their scofflaws (customers unconcerned that they were breaking the law), collected their lettuce (cash), which could be a fin, sawbuck, or double-sawbuck (five, ten, or twenty dollar bill), and bloused out (left). If the scofflaw was lucky the hooch was the cat’s pajamas. A snake charmer whose hooch was the cat’s pajamas was the cat’s meow for scofflaws and their flappers who weren’t encumbered by a fire extinguisher and were looking forward to being embalmed.