Purity Above All

 by Susan Zehnder, Education Director

This is a story of a business whose success literally ran dry. In early 1900, downtown Elmira was abuzz. There were over 35,000 people living in the city and 54,000 in the county.

Water Street under water

While a year earlier, the city’s commercial area had flooded, the spring now saw the area recovering and prosperous. Business opportunities were growing. One business looking to expand into the area was Salzman & Siegelman, a wholesale wine and liquor store based out of Brooklyn, New York. Their Brooklyn store had been so successful that they’d been able to add stores in Albany, Amsterdam, Syracuse, and Troy. Now, in the spring of 1900, they were opening a sixth shop at 108 East Water Street in downtown Elmira.

The turn of the 20^th century saw a rise in the trend of drinking at home. It was a change from the past, when liquor and wine were mainly purchased and consumed in bars and saloons, often dark and smoky places. Leading up to the store’s May 5^th opening day, Salzman & Siegelman had been getting the store ready and advertising for weeks aiming to attract modern men and women interested in purchasing alcohol to drink at home. 

The Elmira store would be well stocked with the largest selection of wine and liquor in the area. It would carry the very best products and gladly refund customers if anything was found wanting. Because they’d learned from experience, they hired saleswomen to attract more women customers. Women, they found, were the primary customers when it came to purchasing liquor this way. Finally,  for an open and family-friendly atmosphere, the store’s walls and large shelves were painted white and well lit. Another draw was that for weeks ahead of its May opening, Salzman & Siegelman had been advertising that they would be giving every purchaser a souvenir card for a free quart bottle of Red Cross Port.

The man behind this business was thirty-year-old Morris Salzman. Salzman was born in Austria in 1870, and arrived in New York City at sixteen years old. He lived in the city’s Lower East Side, among other Jewish immigrants. He went to work in the growing liquor business, both making and selling whiskey. He adopted the motto Purity Above All and included it on everything he sold to promote the quality of his product. It must have worked, since his business boomed. By his early twenties, he had accumulated considerable wealth and expertise. He married Rose, another Austrian-American Jew, and the couple had three children. Around this time, he also went into business with Meyer Siegelman, forming the company Salzman & Siegelman.

The Salzman Family

Unfortunately, the new store’s May 5^th opening day in Elmira had a few hiccups. After weeks of whipped-up anticipation, several hundred customers lined the sidewalk hoping to gain admittance and receive their free port. By evening, the crowd had grown so large and impatient, the clerks were forced to limit customers in the shop to only 50 at a time. Four policemen were called in to restore order. By 10 pm, over 1,200 bottles of Red Cross Port had been given out, which still left hundreds more customers empty-handed. The store promised to honor their promise to any patrons who missed out.

Eventually things were resolved, and the store attempted other promotions and attractions. One that caught the attention of the newspaper was a window display of an eternally pouring bottle of Empire rye whiskey. It seemed to defy nature and intrigue passersby. Other promotions Salzman offered were shot glasses, whiskey jars, and bottles, complete with his purity motto.

Less than four years after their Elmira store opened, Salzman & Siegelman’s business partnership fractured. While the reasons are unknown, the two men filed injunctions against each other. Each ended up starting competing liquor stores, but not in Elmira. Here, the store became Salzman & Co. Its last business listing in the Elmira City Directories was 1919, the year before Prohibition started.

In 1920, Morris Salzman joined the Greenpoint National Bank briefly before leaving and starting his own company, Colonial Discount Company out of Brooklyn. It offered loans for automobiles, another growing field. Salzman died in Brooklyn at 61 years of age in 1930. The obituary described him as a philanthropist and banker, with no mention of his whiskey making-- not a surprise since the country was still under prohibition and dry.

Today, you can still find bottles and liquor jugs with the Salzman name and the purity motto on them. It’s interesting to note that unlike many other whiskey makers, Salzman was never cited by state or national authorities for adulterating his liquor or wines.

Beer Returns to Chemung County

by Erin Doane, Curator

It was 88 years ago this week that people in Elmira and surrounding towns tasted beer again after years of Prohibition. Nationally, Prohibition began on January 17, 1920 but Elmira had gone dry 15 months earlier on October 1, 1918. Between then and April 7, 1933, not a single drop of alcohol passed the lips of anyone in the county.

A group of men eating, drinking, and being merry in 1886

Okay, that’s not true at all. Throughout the entirety of Prohibition, illegal beer and hard liquor had been available (clickhere to read about the Briggs Brewery operation) and some low-alcohol beverages were legal to sell and consume (click here to learn about “near beer” and cereal beverages). For law-abiding beer lovers, however, the years had been quite dry. So, many people were excited when President Franklin Roosevelt signed the Cullen-Harrison Act on March 22, 1933 which legalized beer with an alcohol content of 3.2 percent. Previously under the Volstead Act, all beverages with an alcohol content of over 0.5 percent were illegal. On April 7, 1933, 3.2 percent beer became legal to sell and consume in 19 states, including New York, that did not have state prohibition laws that would supersede the federal legislation.

Map of states (marked in black) where 3.2 percent beer became legal on April 7, 1933, Star-Gazette, March 16, 1933

As soon as the act was signed, breweries jumped into action to get beer legally to their customers. They had two weeks to ramp up production before thirsty men and women could again partake of their beverages. Distributors, wholesalers, and retailers also began scrambling to get the precious brew. For those in Chemung County, the new beer was coming from the American Brewing Company of Rochester, West End Brewing Company of Utica, and from several other breweries in New York or New Jersey. The Nectar Brewery on Tuttle Avenue in Elmira (previously Mander’s Brewery before Prohibition) did not restart its operation until later in April. Briggs Brewery, by the way, did not ever switch to producing the lower-alcohol beer, preferring to continue illegally producing the full-strength stuff. 

The rush between President Roosevelt signing the Cullen-Harrison Act into law and its implementation just 15 days later was not just a challenge for breweries and beer distributors. The new federal law went into effect so quickly that state governments and local municipalities did not have time to make their own regulations. Elmira Police Chief Elvin D. Weaver said that local police had no jurisdiction over the sale of beer until a state law was put into effect as there were no city ordinances governing beer traffic. All that was needed to become a legal beer seller was a retail license, which the federal government was reportedly giving out indiscriminately to anyone who paid the $20 licensing fee. Beer would soon be available at bars, hotels, restaurants, pool halls, grocers, gas stations, and even soft drink stands in parks. 

The intersection of Water and Main Street in Elmira, early 1930s

Some local businesses took polls of their patrons to see if they were interested in buying beer. One unnamed restaurant reported to the Star-Gazette that the vote was 10 to 1 in favor of the sale of beer there. The Mark Twain Hotel manager announced that beer would be offered for sale in the coffee shop and with room services. Other businesses decided to wait and see how the rollout went. There was still considerable opposition to the consumption of alcoholic beverages in Elmira and throughout the entire nation. Frank E. Gannett took a stand against any sort of beer advertisements in his newspapers. Clinton N. Howard of Rochester, one of country’s most militant dry leaders, who had spoken on several occasions in Elmira, sent a message to President Roosevelt that read in part, “with the single exception of the crucifixion of the Son of God by the politicians of Jerusalem, legalization of beer is the crowning infamy of the ages.”

Despite uncertainty and opposition, at the stroke of midnight on Friday, April 7, 1933 barrels and bottles of 3.2 beer were loaded into waiting trucks at the breweries and government seals were broken on railroad cars that had already arrived at distribution hubs. The first shipment arrived in Elmira at 8:00 a.m. with more quickly following. Wholesalers purchased the beer at $2 to $2.50 per case (around $40 to $50 today) then turned around and sold it for 20 cents ($4) a bottle or 10 cents ($2) a glass for draft beer. The demand, however, greatly outpaced the supply and by noon many were left disappointed as they moved from one watering hole to the next searching for the highly-desired beverage. Several restaurants had promised beer with lunch but were not able to deliver. By Saturday morning, the supplies had been replenished and plenty of 3.2 beer was available for the rest of the weekend.

“First Shipment of Legal Beer Arrives This Morning,” Star-Gazette, April 7, 1933

It is estimated that within the first 24 hours, 1.5 million barrels of beer were sold in New York State. Despite not having passed laws yet regulating the new beer trade, Governor Lehman had signed a dollar-a-barrel beer tax in time to collect some substantial revenue for the state. New York City alone made $200,000 in fees from issuing retail permits. Nationally, the stock market rose in the hopes that legal manufacturing and distribution of beer would stimulate business in general.

Locally, the grand rollout of 3.2 beer seemed to have gone smoothly, despite shortages. Elmira police encountered no unusual disturbances that first weekend and reported that it was, in fact, unusually peaceful downtown. By Monday, April 10, “wet hysteria” had died down. In his ‘Round Town column in the Star-Gazette, Matthew Darrin Richardson summed it up by writing, “Beer ought to pretty well recover from its hysteria this week and settle down to regular traffic…By this time Elmirans should have satisfied their curiosity, if not their thirst entirely.”

 

Our Local Whiskeys

by Erin Doane, Curator

InternationalWhisk(e)y Day is coming up on March 27 and World Whisky Day is on May 16 (it takes place on the third Saturday of May each year). This is a great time to learn about whiskey in Chemung County. We have three local whiskey bottles here in the museum’s collection – Land Lord Whiskey, Old Lowman Whiskey, and Macmore Whiskey.

Whiskey bottles in the collection of the Chemung County Historical Society

Old Lowman Whiskey

In 1792, Jacob Lowman set up a distillery on a parcel of land on the Chemung River in what is now Lowman. It was the first commercial distillery in the county, producing whiskey from mixed mash of rye and corn. Some years later, George Lowman operated a distillery on Baldwin Creek producing Old Lowman Whiskey using the same recipe Jacob used. The distillery operated until the Civil War when high taxes forced the business to close.

In 1902, Edward Lowman, Fred Ferris, Fred L. Thomas, and Nathan Blostein incorporated the Old Lowman Distilling Company to manufacture, supply, and deal in whiskey and other alcoholic liquors. The company’s headquarters were in Elmira, and the distillery was in a converted creamery in Lowman near the Delaware and Lackawanna Railroad tracks. Jacob Lowman’s original recipe was used to make the whiskey.

Old Lowman Distillery and Warehouse

Image from “Hardwood Bark,” the magazine of Cotton-Hnlon and Ireland Mill, May-June 1973

I read somewhere that Klapproth’s Saloon in Elmira was said to have exclusive sale of Old Lowman Whiskey, but it was also available from Fred Ferris’s store at 201 Railroad Avenue in Elmira. Ferris was a partner in the distilling company, and he was also a wholesale dealer in wines, liquors, tobacco, and cigars. He had started his business in 1897. Additionally, he sold the “finest food for medicinal purposes,” and ran a saloon. 

Ferris’s store with Fred himself standing at the corner, early 1900s

On October 1, 1918, the city of Elmira officially went “dry,” making the sale of alcoholic beverages illegal. This effectively killed the Old Lowman Distilling Company’s business, and the distillery closed for good.

Macmore Whiskey

In 1907, after 18 years working for J.J. O’Connor wholesale liquor, Michael E. McElligott opened his own wholesale liquor business at 111 Railroad Avenue in Elmira. One of his products was Macmore Whiskey.

Macmore Whiskey promotional tray

In 1911, there were two versions of the whiskey available: Macmore Blend and Macmore Bottled in Bond. I don’t know precisely the difference between the two, but the blend bottle was labeled with McElligott’s name while the other had R.W. Wathen & Company of Kentucky as the distiller.

Advertisement from the Star-Gazette, December 18, 1911

By early 1918, talk of local prohibition was in the air, and it seemed to be a perfect time for McElligott to diversify his business. He purchased what was known at the Richardson building at the corner of Railroad Avenue and Market Street. He set up his shop on the first floor, and rented out the upper floor.

Land Lord Whiskey

Around 1914, James G. McLaughlin and John R. Flynn opened their wholesale liquor business at the corner of Fox and Carroll Streets in Elmira. There they sold Land Lord Whiskey, among other things.

Land Lord Whiskey bottle

When the city went dry, McLaughlin & Flynn Co. suffered. In October 1920, the company sold off 1,000 empty barrels that were “first class for cider or grape juice.” Less than three years later, the company officially dissolved. McLaughlin went on to run the Carey Medicine Company, and Flynn worked in real estate.

Whiskey and Churches??

Finally, in my research, I found two interesting connections between these liquor companies and local churches that I just had to share. First connection: After the Old Lowman Distilling Company closed in 1918, Edward Lowman had the warehouse torn down. He then donated the lumber to the Lowman M.E. Church, and it was used to build a community hall. And the second connection: When renovations were being done on the Park Church in 1958, a bottle of Macmore Whiskey was found inside one of the walls there.

Macmore bottle found inside a wall at the Park Church