5. McSorley’s Used to Be Called “The Old House at Home”

When the pub first opened, John McSorley named it after his favorite pub at home in Ireland. Old John escaped the famine, and opened “The Old House at Home” in New York City. No one called the pub that, however. All referred to it as McSorley’s instead. In 1908, two years before Old John McSorley died, a storm blew the sign off the façade of the building. When John ordered a new sign, he renamed the place “McSorley’s Old Ale House.”