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About Us >> Ye Historie Dipsomanae

Ye Historie Dipsomanae


DIPSOMANIA: "A Morbid Fascination With Alcohol"

Collins Concise Dictionary 

In circa. 1996 co-founder Stuart Carroll found the word "dipsomania" in his dictionary, while looking up another word. The definition given was "A morbid fascination with alcohol". Stu informed co-founder Dom of this word & they both loved it so much that decided to use it somewhere in the name of the drinking club that they wanted to begin.

Dom and Stu in "Coasters" which became "Oceans 11" which became "Bobby's Bar", which is now "Bobby's All-American Bar & Grill"
DOM (left) and STU (right) started young
The idea for this drinking club had begun several years before, and its main goal was going to be to perform the "Monopoly Board Pubcrawl"* through the streets of London. Unfortunately this would never come to pass. During this time the only members of the drinking club were co-founders Stu and Dom, due to their schoolmates (it was a long time ago) pointing out to them just how expensive & stupid the Monopoly Board Pubcrawl idea was.

Stu and Dom then directed their attentions closer to home, and began devising the "Bye-Bye Bladder" Pubcrawl that would include all of the pubs within the Wallasey area, and take 2 full days to complete. Planning was still underway on this monstrous task when Ruth announced that for her 1997 birthday she would like people to go on a Pubcrawl. Stu and Dom decided to hijack the organisation of this, smaller event in the hope that it would lead to "Bye-Bye Bladder" coming to pass. However, it did much more; it showed them that one day's worth of drinking was enough & that it was something that could be done at regular intervals. The drinking group was finally born, but still un-named.

Indeed the name Dipsomania Society was only added to the group in the Autumn of 1997, when Dom & Stu had gone off to University and found during Freshers' Fair that universities have lots of "societies" which are comprised of groups of students believing in things. Dom & Stu laughed at the "hard rock"/"heavy drinking"-type societies that existed in Liverpool & Staffordshire Universities, and jokingly suggested that they begin their own Dipsomania Society. The name stuck.

The Dipsomania Society is an alcohol appreciation organisation that praises the effects of alcohol on our bodies and minds. We devise and organise pubcrawls at arbitrary points in the year for people to get together and drink continuously all day. This is the kind of drinking that some people reserve for stag/hen parties, but we feel that being in a group of good friends, and having a lot of pubs within walking distance should be a celebration in itself, so we celebrate.

It is not our wish to be flippant, nor to mislead our members with regards to the damages that alcohol, can, has and will do to the human body. This is why the home page of this very website features an Information About Alcohol section, so that our members can receive information from some reputable sources. It is also worth noting that although many people have been sick from drinking too much alcohol, (and Dipso Dom once had to be sped to hospital,) none of our members have suffered any long-term adverse side-effects that can solely be blamed on the alcohol they imbibed during a Dipsomania Society Pubcrawl.


The heartland of the Dipsomania Society's Universe is Stu and Dom's hometown of Wallasey. It was through the streets of Wallasey that the very first Dipsomania Society Pubcrawl took place on Saturday, 18 January 1997. Since then, Wallasey has seen some changes, with pubs closing and pubs opening (one even changing from supermarket into pub) over the years, but all under the society's watchful gaze. The society too has been through several changes: In 2001 Stu decided to leave the group, which resulted in the begining of the Domocracy (Latin for "government by Dom") that existed for a short while. Dom never really wanted to be the sole ruler of the organisation, and so when in 2002 he created the first (crappy) Dipso website, he appointed a team of "Senior Dipsomaniacs" who each had the ability (if not desire) to help him with the organisation of Pubcrawls, and the website content. The routes and locations of the crawls have all been extended; the membership continues to rise at a steady pace (and we hope it will continue to do so); the routes we devise for crawls has matured and grown; with the onset of mobile phone technology we have relaxed our timekeeping; we constitute members over several counties and we now have a website that can challenge the best. In all, we are the most professional pro-drinking group we've ever heard of.

But no matter how far-reaching the Pubcrawls have become, and how professional the society is being organized, the core aims of the Dipsomania Society remain the same: We are a group of friends having fun on a few days out on a ridiculous scale.

The basic pattern of a Dipsomania Society event runs thus: At no point between 11:00 & 23:00 do we enter a "bar" or a "club". This means we drink only in "pubs" (although the difference these days is becoming less distinct, the idea is that a public house is a comfortable place to drink: One expects cosy, warm rooms with nice furniture & soft couches) which allows us to relax and enjoy one another's company as much as the drink.
It is our refusal to venture into raucous venues designed with dancing teeny-boppers in mind that separates us from hen/stag parties & the like: Ours should be seen as more of a social event than merely getting drunk. And they really are always social events to write home about.

While the Dipsomania Society website is soon to close, the society itself will certainly continue for many more years to come.

Dipso Dom

* This idea was stolen from the Grant Naylor novel "Red Dwarf (Infinity Welcomes Careful Drivers)" and was attempted by the character of Dave Lister on his 25th birthday. The net result of this misadventure was his awaking on Mimas. We were pretty damn sure we would fare better, although there's only one way of finding out.