What It Was Like to Be a Prohibition Bootlegger 

My old high school history teacher always said that there are two things you can't govern: morality and stupidity. Prohibition proved it on both accounts

One amusing thing from the time period were "grape bricks". These were openly advertised in magazines as mail order confections made of raisins, sugar and yeast ,compressed into blocks. They came with a warning: “After dissolving the brick in a gallon of water, do not place the liquid in a jug away in the cupboard for twenty days, because then it would turn into wine.”

Growing up in Detroit, I heard stories about bootleggers driving their cars across the Detroit River in winter when the ice was thick and the river traffic was non-existent.

And of course none of those law makers ever went without 🤨

Plenty of bootleggers sold 'door to door'!!! My grandfather delivered booze in a coal truck, another buddy had grandparents that delivered 'fresh vegetables" from a truck..

It’s strange, I see striking similarities in todays society with drug dealers.

I grew up near Chicago and it turned out that the "wealthy cousins" who were then jewelers got their start making labels for bootleg beer.

Thank you so much for fulfilling my history needs. As a mom of 3 I don't get much "me time" and your channel keeps my cognitive wellness treking forward. This is such a great place for a history buff

Here in Boston there’s a bar called “The 21st Amendment” which in the day was a notorious speakie that pretty much operated in the open, considering that its located directly across the street from the State House. Some things never change!

This all looks very familiar… oh well glad we’re learning from our weird history 😉

Boardwalk Empire taught me what I need to know about bootlegging during the prohibition era. Great show!

You might do one about a woman called Carrie Nation. Radically intolerant about alcohol, she would invade taverns and other places that dispensed alcohol, carrying an axe and other weapons, to get her point across. She was, in my opinion, more than a little crazy. Could be an interesting video for you to try. This video about prohibition is, as always with your wonderful "Weird History" videos, fascinating! Keep them coming!

When we moved into this old house in NJ in 1951, we found a treasure trove of stuff that had been left behind in the attic. My father found a carved wooden walking stick with a glass interior that he said had been used to hide liquor during Prohibition.

Ha ha! Thanks for this! I didn’t know about the actual stories behind the rum runners but knew my grandfather on my dad’s side was a rum runner between Canada and Seattle. My grandmother on my mom’s side was flapper in Chicago. I have amazing photos of her then. Prohibition was a terrible mistake. It made the mob rich and very powerful. Ban anything, people always find ways around it.

I'm with the government; I'm here to help!

Thank you for including the speakeasies. As always, your delivery is spot on.

My great grandfather used to keep Virginia's governor and the governor's mansion stocked with 'shine. In the most rural parts of Virginia, 'shine is still produced in copious amounts. You just have to hav e the right connections to obtain it.

The prohibition episode of The Simpsons is still one of my many favorites.

Not only do I love these bits of history, but, love how it's narrated.

Man, this is something. Fascinating insight into the most tumultuous time in American History, Prohibition.

My great grandfather was a bootlegger in Door County Wisconsin. My grandma told me a story about her father dropping a container of liquor late at night outside their house. I guess he frantically cleaned it up before making a run. Hats of to you grandpa

Grandfather had a bottle of something saved from prohibition, when he died my father, aunts and uncles opened and took a shot. If I remember right it my father said tasted horrible, but I guess that's to be expected when something has sat for at least 80 years.

“If you’re gonna break the law, mah as well have fun with it” 😂😂 ngl, that was my approach to cannabis before it became legal. 3 minutes in and I already appreciate the effort of the channel

Would love to hear more about how towns like Prescott Arizona and whiskey row survived the prohibition time Especially because it was a wild West town with lots of history

I always wondered about how many coopers popped up just to make the extra barrels needed and if they made a good living supplying the distillers

Could you imagine what it was like the day that they repealed prohibition I bet the next day the whole nation had a hangover LOL

@32 seconds...."We've got a long way to and a short time to get there" ...."We're east bound so watch oh Bandit run"

I had two great uncles who ran 'rum' from Lake Erie (where it came over from Canada), down to the Ohio River for easier transport. My first exposure to the idea of Prohibition was the two of them laughing their heads off going "remember that time..." My grandfather on the other side of the family was definitely some kind of law-breaker during Prohibition, but no one would say what. Getting older relatives to talk about their lives can be very eye-opening. Just saying.

There’s a fantastic Ken Burns doc all about Prohibition. Much as I love Peter Coyote’s narration on that one, your narrator’s sarcasm deserves its own long form!!! LOL!! Always so entertaining!! :) Another thing about Prohibition is that the government poisoned the alcohol hardcore, hoping that people would stop drinking. It didn’t work (obviously) and more people were being killed by the government, worse than anything alcohol could do to them!!!

I wear a overcoat all the time and I'm not hiding... well, I wear a overcoat all the time.

My great great great grandparents were the founders of Bond & Lillard and Old Ripy, both bourbon distilleries that would eventually become Four Roses and Wild Turkey respectively. Prohibition is the reason the original families don’t own them anymore, but during those days they used to line the walls with bottles of whiskey and hide bottles in the cellar. Some distant relatives even took their distilling operations down to Mexico to get away from it. Meanwhile, on my dad’s side, my great grandpa was the sheriff of his county in Kentucky, and there are newspaper articles with photos showing him arresting his own relatives for moonshining lol

I am so glad NASCAR was formed by bootleggers And next year in 2023 will be NASCAR's 75th Anniversary

Not one of the people responsible for passing these laws was held accountable.

About ten years ago when I was working in the wine & spirits department of a market in southwest New Jersey, we'd have customers who ran speakeasies in nearby Philadelphia. (And yes, they were still referred to by the term.) The alcohol wasn't illegal, but running an establishment without a liquor license was and there were regulations on how much beer one could buy in PA, but not NJ. Plus, the price is MUCH lower. We'd have people buying literal truckloads (and vanloads and carloads), always paying the four figure-plus total in cash, never wanting the receipt and usually putting covers on the cargo before transporting it across the bridge. It wasn't any secret what they were doing and quite a few of them were very open about it. One guy was telling me how his place was raided by police early that morning and he was stocking up for a new location he was opening up that night, all while out on bail. So I guess that store was the "Canada" of this Prohibition Era throwback scheme.

Boardwalk Empire is one of my favorite shows to watch till this day. It inspired me to learn more about life in the roaring 20's.

"Name of a crooked politician..." That's redundant; crooked and politician go hand-in-hand.

My great great uncle was machine gunned to death by rival bootleggers while he was asleep next to his still. His own gang was called the Cuckoo Gang. He was 24 when he was killed.

Later in the forties and fifties a lot of counties in Oklahoma and Texas were “dry” and the bootleggers of “wet” cities would run booze to the drys. We knew which fast hot cars were popular from the rides of the bootleggers. The V-8 Fords and Mercury’s were popular, then the Hudson Hornet, and finally the Oldsmobile Rocket 88 was the choice of bootleggers. Lubbock was dry and many of the Texas Tech students from Wichita Falls paid their tuition by bootlegging.

Well, it's like what Carl Jung once said, "What you resist, persists."

A+ video! Fascinating topic and video!

Great video guys. Very informative as always. It would've been great to get a lil back story segment in the beginning about the term "bootlegging", and/or "bootlegger" from the beginning in America. Thanks for the content!

Fascinating !!! Thanks for the video.

A video on Popcorn Sutton would be cool

Interesting subject so thanks for sharing!

Such a wild time in America, telling people they CAN'T have something is a sure fire way to make them want it more, also a reason why the war on drugs has been a massive failure.

My grandparents were bootleggers as kids. During the depression they would go around Coffeyville Kansas selling baked goods in a concessioners box, which underneath the cookies and brownies my great grandmother made, hid the hooch my great grandfather made.

Have you tried to be sober in the 1920's, ya we are living thru the 20's agian

Like Turdeau banning handguns.

3:57 "Have you ever tried being sober in the 1920s?" Have YOU ever tried being sober in the 2020s!? Ain't nobody that can do that sh*t.

I had a relative that was a bootlegger/rum runner in the 1920s. He would go up to Canada from Upstate New York, get the good Irish whiskey and run it down. He made a lot of money very quickly and died a very sudden, very violent death. His sister, my great grandmother, became super anti-alcohol.

I have multiple family members who were jailed for being bootleggers.

"Boardwalk Empire" is still one of my favorite shows

My great grandpa was a Detroit cop and a bootlegger haha. He and my great grandma would cross into Canada, stashed the liquor in her dress because they couldn't search women, then come back to Detroit. They'd sell out of the Leland hotel on bagley downtown

Hahaha! My great great great grandfather was a Baptist preacher by day, moonshine manufacturing fool by night. 🤭 1920’s. Heard he was quite the uh..heathen. XD.

I havent lived through 1920's, but 2020's are being brutual enough to need a drink.

I grew up on Grosse Ile an island between the US and Canada. They would run the booze from Canada to US over the Detroit river to a house on the island called the Pagoda house. They could drive the boat into the boathouse and unload the booze.

Great video guys!

My grandpa talked about about bootleggers driving & sailing whiskey around the Great Lakes..very lucrative according to him

Thankyou for the information I would like to hear more about the Temperance Union during prohibition

These guys have been amazing with all their content!!

Long live the 1920's

There are gravestones in our cemetery which have hidden compartments where a dealer would leave liquor in the compartment and the buyer would then come after and take the liquor and leave the money in the spot, it's actually really fascinating history just the absolute lengths people went to this trade and the number of silly and convoluted ways you could acquire it. Our family were farmers so they just made barley beer for themselves during prohibition, thug life.

Please cover more NASCAR History as well as a NASCAR Timeline Series

...."Eastbound and Down" Jerry Reed

Cheers to the bootleggers

I live in a campervan in Detroit...my grandpa drove liquor across the Detroit river every winter. He made good money then met Roy Kroc the founder of McDonald's, he helped his start and grow the business...he was married in Roy's living room in Chicago then Roy gave him a 1962 rolls Royce which my grandma still owns and will be passed on to me

No Gatsby references? For shame!

I like that you started the video off with lyrics about smuggling Coors east of the Mississippi

I would love to hear about prohibition in Utah. Ogden Utah supposedly has a huge underground rail system for bootlegging. And Al Capone supposedly hid there for a while and said it was too much for him.

Thanks for this! 🍾 #WeirdHistory #Prohibition #Bootleggers

As a Jerry Reed fan, I greatly appreciated the reference at the beginning. Keep loaded up and truckin'.

*Ale* Capone. Good one.

This is the greatest example of: "The Cobra Effect" at play here! 🍻

Love the smokey and the bandit quote

During prohibition in the rural areas across USA there were perhaps many thousands that distilled moonshine made mainly with corn mash. Lots did not know how to do proper distillation and the alcohol had some percent of methanol. That can cause at minimum a very nasty headache and if too much it’s blindness or death. Methanol alcohol is still going around now in many areas of the world. Even popular brands of whiskey and vodka are watered down with methanol.

That's why I think drugs should be legalized, taxed and controlled just like alcohol and tobacco. If there's a will, there's a way. People will continue to use booze and drugs no matter what so we should manage the best way possible.

"To alcohol,the cause of and solution to all of life's problems"

Wouldn’t have stopped me from drinking beer

1:41 I just want to register my appreciation for this amazing acting performance from the silhouette, I tasted every drop.

A friend inherited an old Philco radio that had been retro fitted with a bar. His uncle had been an attorney and had the bar in his office. It was lovely.

Animated sitcom dads..like The Beer Baron

Cheers!

My grandfather was a moonshiner in Wisconsin, Trempealeau County. Distilled in a silo, transported horse and buggy, hidden under loads of cord wood. To get a drink one had to stand at a certain part of the Cafe counter and ask for a certain drink special. Grandfather would be gone for days and return unconscious because horses knew where to go. Grandmother would speak of this occasionally, Grandfather never mentioned it.

@weirdhistory can u make video about American pitbull history?

I have some antique bottles and through them I learned about Jamaican ginger!! It was for tummy ache but became a go to drink for booze during the prohibition and then the government put actual poison in it so folks would not abuse it drinking whole bottles. Every bottle haunts me a bit because the death rate for those who drank it was the highest for any medicine that was tainted intentionally to prevent abuse by the public. Could you please do a video about the "medicines" that people turned to when booze was gone? The buyers for Jamaican ginger were usually poor and they usually died after the "additive" of a poison was added. The idea is people know its got an additive taste bad and would stop drinking it but people being people and loads of denial they just drank it and died. Could you also do a video about Paraquat? When I grew up in the 70's and 80's I saw on the news some folks smoked the marijuana that government sprayed with paraquat and died. Being from the emerald triangle and having a dope attorney for a dad we all knew to stay away from Mexican grown marijuana until the paraquat was abolished. Basically same story as the alcohol. The US said hey Mexico do something to abated the import of marijuana and so they poisoned it!

Do a video on the police during the prohibition era or I've heard of some of the strange things that happened in that time

Old Man River! That seems far too austere a name for something made of mirth and rage. O, roiling red-blood river vein, If chief among your traits is age, you're a wily, convoluted sage. Is "old" the thing to call what rings the vernal heart of wester-lore; What brings us brassy-myth made kings (And preponderance of bug-type things) To challenge titans come before? Demiurge to a try at Avalon-once-more! And what august vitality In your wide aorta stream You must have had to oversee alchemic change of timber beam to iron, brick and engine steam. Your umber whiskey waters lance the prideful sober sovereignty of faulty-haloed Temperance and wilt her self-sure countenance; Yes, righteousness is vanity, But your sport's for imps, not elderly. If there's a name for migrant mass of veteran frivolity that snakes through seas of prairie grass and groves of summer sassafras, a name that flows as roguishly As gypsy waters, fast and free, it's your real name, Mississippi

My dads parents were bootleggers. I’m not sure how old he was when his mom died…I think 15. He didn’t work with them, but I think he became a runner. Apparently he had a red roadster, that ended up in a ditch. Whitefish Montana

If there wasn't any prohibition, they might have been "The Boring 20's". That law defined the decade.

I wish I had a beer after watching that😎👍I'm beer less🍺the champagne of beers 🥂.

You can thank both sides of my family for sailing booze from Halifax Nova Scotia down to Enoch Thompson's lads in New Jersey and our brothers in Boston. There was a more lucrative use for the Bluenose (the fastest schooner of the time) and many many more like her beside winning trophies or fishing cod fish. A sailing schooner was much faster in the North Atlantic than the steam powered vessel in those days. What, you think they air dropped it from Windsor Ontario, hahaha.

The city of Moose Jaw in Saskatchewan Canada is linked to bootlegging during prohibition, the city has underground tunnels built by Chinese railroad workers and were later used by bootleggers. Al Capone is suspected of having visited the city, but there's not much evidence to support it. Canada did have a temporary nationwide ban on alcohol from 1918 to 1920, the government prohibited the importation of alcohol over 2.5%. They also banned the Inter-provincal trade of alcohol and the production of alcohol. Bootlegging didn't stop in Canada after the ban on alcohol was lifted, due to the continued prohibition in the US.

My great grandfather ran liquor for Capone.

So many bootleggers,yet a few law enforcer. That really is a ridiculous to boot.

Some companies would "unintentionally" mention that if you mixed their product in a certain way you would end up with alcohol keep in mind they weren't saying you should do it just that you could do it lol.

Bootleggers in the South also created NASCAR

My father had a deal with the Coast Guard. The Coast Guard would intercept the rumruners and leave a few cases on the pier on Catalina Island, where my father and friends would pick it up for later retrieval. For this service, my father and buddies got to keep half.

My grandfather and his brother used to run moonshine from West Virginia to many of the large eastern cities. They actually became sort of local legends after killing two of Al Capone's men that tried to rip them off during a rendezvous in Dayton, Ohio. They returned home with the moonshine, the money, a tommy gun, and an extra vehicle. 🍻

The only thing I would do during that time would probably be transporting while walking as its simpler than possibly getting caught in those fake transport trucks as the cops I'm sure were always on the lookout for them

I owned a caddillqc that had lifts specifically for rum running according to the owner before me. It was an early 50s model but damn was it cool