(The Owl’s Eye) Coffee anyone?
Published 1:02 am Saturday, September 26, 2026
Owls like me love a good cup of black, rich coffee. I’d like to perch and tell you of a few magnificent discoveries of superior coffee houses I, along with Mrs. Owl, have made lately. But first, let me explain why this even matters.
Coffee is not only a thirst quencher, but a brew that causes you to reflect on events of the day. Howso? Consider how it became the center of an entire cultural change about 250 years ago.
With origins in ancient times in what is now Yemen, coffee slowly worked its way along trade routes to Italy. Its only origin port until the mid-1600s was Mocha, Yemen, but that was to change. Demand for coffee spread to the world trading nations of the Netherlands, Portugal, France and England. Seeds were imported to Martinique in the New World, and from there on coffee became a world class beverage.
Historically important was its impact in Europe. Europe became the home of the ‘Coffee House’ in the Age of Enlightenment. Here in these new halls of percolating aroma people would gather to discuss social, scientific, and political events while drinking coffee. Coffee meant gathering, and gathering brought about discussion. Such discussions changed the world.
So, about this time the Enlightenment occurred. Philosophers and writers developed new ways to think about their world, and coffee arrived from the Mediterranean. New ideas were afoot which demanded thought, then discussion.
What does good government mean? Are we subjects, or citizens? Who should rule us? How should we decide what is cruel, rather than just punishment for crime? Coffee houses were where all these new, tantalizing ideas were talked about.
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New ideas blossomed on every topic in these houses.
How do crops affect the soil all around us? How can we map our world? How can we predict sea movements, or find the location of resource deposits in our earth?
The scientific method began to be applied to so many questions. ‘Where to begin seeing our new world with new eyes?’ enticed so many young people at the time. They wanted to share their thoughts with others.
The origin of coffee houses came together with a great expansion of education as well. If men could not read yet, they could still gather in coffeehouses to listen to pamphlets written by those with new ideas. Drawings of the day show people listening to a Voltaire pamphlet.
Imagine you are there when this proposition is made, “Those who can make you believe absurdities can make you commit atrocities.” True? Next, your coffeehouse friends suggest you discuss this.
What would you say? Or how about colonial Americans sitting in a coffee aroma filled room in Boston. Someone reads aloud from a pamphlet by Tom Paine, ““To argue with a person who has renounced the use of reason is like administering medicine to the dead.”
Paine was a proponent of American liberty from the British crown. Can you place yourself in the same room where, for the first time a man argues that others reason together to answer a question vexing all men at that time? Should we not be free?
We in Limestone County should talk to one another more. There are plenty of coffee houses to choose from, so why not begin there?
Engage with friends or new acquaintances at ‘Coffee Off The Square’, a truly fine, relaxing, and thought evoking place. Maybe try ‘Beignets and Brew’ in Madison, right on County Line Road! Both have excellent coffee, and most important, places to sit and discuss with friends.
In places like this you can share reasonable observations on the day’s affairs, just like in those coffee houses 250 years ago. We moderns can discuss anything, from Shakespeare, Sherlock Holmes, to events of the day. Why not ask one another to offer comments about, say, our society’s treatment of others? There we can ask whether our holding pens, such as we’ve built at Florida’s ‘Alligator Alcatraz’, reveals our true society. After all we can ask, as Tom Paine did, whether “the true greatness of a nation is founded on principles of humanity.”
Meet your friends at a coffee house. It will be just like all those years ago. Ask tough questions that reasonable people can consider. Then act to do something about changing our world.
Oh, just one more thing to think about. King Charles II of England issued a proclamation to close the coffee houses in his realm. They were considered subversive. They were. People started to think in these places. In fact, they were so popular Charles was forced to cancel his proclamation one year later.
Athens resident John William Davis is a veteran and author.
