A famous Paris bar is celebrating 100 years of a poll it holds among Americans on who will win the next presidential election.
Harry’s Bar, a small slice of old New York close to the Paris Opera, opened the poll on Monday, October 7.
American expats and visitors can cast their vote, provided they can prove their citizenship by showing their passport or driving licence.
Harry’s Bar was opened by jockey Tod Sloan in 1911 as ‘New York Bar’. A former bistro, its interior is the reassembled wooden cladding of a real New York bar, which Sloan dismantled and shipped to Paris.
It was bought by Scottish barman Harry MacElhone in 1924, who christened it ‘Harry’s Bar’. The bar has remained in the family, and is now run by Harry’s great-grandson.
The straw poll has become an institution since it was started by Harry himself in 1924, when Americans in Paris could not vote in the real election.
Harry's Bar
This year, American author Douglas Kennedy was the first to add his ballot to the padlocked wooden box.
The fake vote is notoriously accurate, having successfully predicted the election winner in every election in 100 years except for three – 1976, 2004 and 2016.
Provisional results are written on the bar mirror and the final result will be revealed during a special election night party on November 5.
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Every election, the bar creates two bespoke cocktails to pay homage to the candidates.
This year, patrons can sample the ‘Trumpet’ and the ‘Kamala Harry’s Bar’.
Harry’s is famed for being a hangout of American greats including Ernest Hemingway and Humphrey Bogart and even, in the story A View to a Kill by British author Ian Fleming, James Bond himself.
It claims to have created several famous cocktails including the Bloody Mary.
