Confiscated bottled liquor facing destruction in March on 1923. Library of Congress
Life as a bootlegger
No matter where he or she stood on the supply chain, the life of a bootlegger was not an easy one. There were many hands to be greased, products to be monitored, officials to be dodged, and competitors to be dealt with. But for many bootleggers, it was a highly lucrative trade, and for the most part, one with upward mobility if one proved his ability on the job.
By the late 1920s the manufacture, transportation, distribution, and sale of liquor, all of which was against the law of the land, was the leading business in the United States according to some estimates, both in number of employees and in revenues generated. The loss of taxes collected by the government was one of the biggest factors in the repeal of nationwide Prohibition in the early 1930s. By then the country was mired in the Great Depression and the government needed the money.
In the many dry counties and communities which remained in the United States following Prohibition, the profession of bootlegger remains, seen in the moonshiners of Appalachia and elsewhere. They encounter the same risks and reap the same rewards as the bootleggers of the Roaring Twenties, providing a source for alcoholic beverages in regions where the powers that be are determined to protect people from their own lack of moral fiber and character.
Where do we find this stuff? Here are our sources:
“The Restless Decade”, by Bruce Catton, American Heritage Magazine, August 1965
“The Dry Decade”, by Charles Merz, 2017
“Prohibition: Thirteen Years that Changed America”, by Edward Behr, 1996
“Dry Manhattan: Prohibition in New York City”, by Michael A. Lerner, 2007
“A Bootleggers Story Part I, How I Started”, anonymous, The New Yorker, September 25, 1926
“The Rumrunners: A Prohibition Scrapbook”, by C. H. Gervais, 2009
“Prohibition: America Makes Alcohol Illegal”, by Daniel Cohen, 1995
“The Rise of American Wine”, by Paul Lukacs, American Heritage Magazine, December 1996
“Medicinal Alcohol”, anonymous, Ohio State University Temperance and Prohibition Page, OSU.edu
“A Bootleggers Story Part III, Methods”, anonymous, The New Yorker, September 1926
“Bar? What Bar?”, by William Grimes, The New York Times, June 2, 2009
“Last Call: The Rise and Fall of Prohibition”, by Daniel Okrent, 2010
“American Walks into a Bar”, by Christine Sismodo, 2011
“Deliver Us from Evil: An Interpretation of American Prohibition”, by Norman H. Clark, 1976