Green’s Dictionary of Slang

1. (US) a form of hatch used by moonshiners, so as to create anopnymity between seller/purchaser. Money and an empty bottle are put in one side, and when they have been extracted at the other, the bottle is filled with moonshine and sent back through .

1857		Spirit of the Times (NY) 23 May 182/1: I sees a kinder pigeon-hole cut in the side of a house, and over the hole, in big writin’, ‘Blind Tiger, ten cents a sight’ [...] Says I to the feller inside, ‘here’s your ten cents, walk out your wild-cat.’ Stranger, instead of showin’ me a wild varmint without eyes, I’ll be dod-busted if he didn’t shove out a glass of whiskey .
1886		Nat. Police Gaz. (NY) 17 Apr. 7/2: This so-called ‘blind tiger’ is constructed of an oblong box without ends, which is fastened into a hole through the side of the house. Fitting closely into this is a drawer of the same length. The buyer knocks on the box. and the drawer is pushed outside. When the money and bottle are placed in it, it is drawn back, the bottle filled and returned, and the money taken out, neither party recognizing the other in the transaction.

2. an unlicensed drinking house; also attrib.

1860		Beds. Times 31 July 2/5: [from Spirit of the Times (NY) ] A man who recollects well when the ‘Blind Tiger’ was the terror of the state, and ‘Tiger’s Milk’ was the favorite beverage of ferocious youths.
1883		Arkansas Digest Laws (1884) 493: Any person [...] who shall sell [...] any alcohol [...] by such device as is known as ‘the blind tiger,’ [...] shall be deemed guilty of a misdemeanor [DAE].
1885		Atlanta Constitution (GA) 1 June 2/5: I don’t know where some worthless blacks [...] will get their toddy [...] if they have been amongst the patrons of these ‘tigers’.
1893		G.A. Sala in Daily Tel. 25th Oct. in Ware (1909) 110/2: In many places (U.S.A.), especially in the cities, the existence of the law makes no real difference ; in some few, by fits and starts, it is rigidly enforced, and the consequence is that the drinking is driven underground, into what they variously call ‘dives’, ‘speakeasies’, and ‘kitchen bar rooms’ in the North ; and ‘blind pigs’ and ‘blind tigers’ in the South.
1896		Canton Times (MS) 24 July 5/2: Two men were killed [...] the result of blind tiger whiskey.
1897		Perryburg Jrnl (OH) 27 Nov. 1/6: [used generically] The ‘blind tiger,’ as the illicit whiskey trade is called, has at present a much wider range of territory.
1899		Watchman & Southron (SC) 25 Jan. 4/1: There were hundreds of blind tiger joints running day and night.
1905		New Enterprise (Madison, FL) 4 May 4/1: The Jasper News is waging vigorous warfare against the ‘blind tigers’ which [...] infest Hamilton County.
1908		K. McGaffey Sorrows of a Show Girl Ch. vi: We capered blithely out to the machine, climbed in and hiked for the blind tiger.
1910		Bulletin (Sydney) 13 Oct. 19/3: I’ve often wondered what the Americans mean when they speak of ‘boot-leggers,’ ‘pocket-peddlers,’ ‘blind tigers,’ ‘speak-easys’ and ‘blind pigs’ in connection with the ‘dry’ territories in the land of the grilled nigger. I know, of course, that they are all contrivances for the illicit sale of grog [...].
1919		C.S. Montanye ‘Hoodwinked’ in Detective Story 30 Apr. 🌐 Whatever money he stole, begged, or earned, he promptly squandered in booze purchased in the numerous ‘blind tigers’ of the underworld.
1922		S.V. Benét Young People’s Pride 135: The brutal quarrel with Nancy. The rush to the nearest blind-tiger. The debauch.
1927		H. Asbury Gangs of N.Y. 10: 270 saloons, and several times that number of blind tigers, dance halls, houses of prostitution.
1936		(con. 1920s) Dos Passos Big Money in USA (1966) 798: He went to a blind tiger he knew and had [...] some glasses of needle beer.
1943		Baker ‘Influence of American Sl. on Australia’ in AS XVIII:4 256: Here is a representative group of Americanisms which have wide currency in Australia: [...] blind tiger.
1949		Monteleone Criminal Sl. (rev. edn).
1989		H. Rawson Dict. of Invective (1991) 298: A blind pig (also a blind tiger) is a place where liquor is sold illegally.
1993		I.L. Allen City in Sl. (1995) 72: The old terms blind tiger and blind pig were revived for humorous use during Prohibition and New Yorkers applied them to any speakeasy.

3. illicit whisky.

1905		Rice Belt Jrnl (Welsh, LA) 23 June 4/1: We blowed another quarter on [...] twom drinks of ‘pine-top,’ ‘blind tiger’ liquor.
1929		L. Axley ‘Drunk’ Again’ in AS IV:6 440: blind tiger—used for the drink as well as the institution.
1960, 1975		Wentworth & Flexner DAS 43/1: Cheap or inferior whisky.

4. the owner of an illicit bar.

1924

W.F. White Fire in Flint 157: Every blamed bootlegger and blind tiger and whoremaster in town rushed into the Klan [HDAS].