Three Dots and a Dash

Rhum agricole, aged rum, falernum, and honey — Donn Beach's WWII V-for-Victory tribute, the garnish spelling the Morse code V in cherries and pineapple.

Three Dots and a Dash was created during World War II by Donn Beach at his Don the Beachcomber establishments in Chicago, sometime during the period when Beach himself served in the United States Army Air Forces from 1942 to 1945. The cocktail's name is Morse code: three dots and a dash is the symbol for the letter V — for Victory — a communication standard adopted by Allied forces and popularized by Winston Churchill's iconic V-for-Victory hand gesture, which he began making publicly in 1941. The garnish translates the code into visual form: three maraschino cherries represent the three dots, and a rectangular chunk of pineapple or a pineapple frond represents the dash. The drink itself is one of the most complex in the tiki canon, combining rhum agricole from Martinique — whose grassy, fresh-cane character differs fundamentally from molasses-based rum — with an aged rum, falernum, allspice dram, honey syrup, orange juice, and lime juice. Falernum and allspice dram are both spiced Caribbean liqueurs: falernum is a light syrupy blend of almond, clove, ginger, and lime typical to Barbados, while allspice dram brings the warm berry-pepper-clove notes of pimento. Like all of Beach's recipes, it was encoded at the time to prevent copying. Jeff Berry recovered and published the authentic formula in his book Sippin' Safari (2007), and the cocktail has since become one of the defining drinks of the tiki revival.