Looking for a good time in St. Louis when their team came to play the Cardinals, Reds fans rolled out the barrels and got busted.
One hundred years ago, in April 1925, Reds owner Garry Herrmann and seven others associated with the Reds Rooters fan club were arrested at the Hotel Statler for possessing real beer.
Home to breweries such as Anheuser-Busch and Falstaff, St. Louis was synonymous with suds, but not during the Prohibition era in the U.S.
Herrmann and the Reds Rooters found out the hard way when federal agents raided their roost before a game.
Dry land
Influenced by repressive religious groups, particularly Christian denominations, and temperance organizations, federal lawmakers approved an amendment to the Constitution that prohibited the production, importation, transportation and sale of alcoholic beverages. The Prohibition era lasted from 1920 to 1933 and prompted gangsters to fill the void with violent bootlegging businesses.
In his book “Mr. Rickey’s Redbirds,” author Mike Mitchell noted, “The battle over Prohibition pitted rural versus urban, Protestant versus Catholic, native-born Americans versus newly arrived immigrants … War gave a final push toward a national prohibition. Those who wanted to ban alcohol often made no distinction between America’s enemies in World War I and brewers in the United States with European heritage.”
St. Louis breweries Anheuser-Busch and Falstaff survived Prohibition by producing near beer, a malt beverage which typically had an alcohol content of less than 0.5 percent, and other products, such as soda pop. (The Anheuser-Busch near beer was called Bevo.) Most other St. Louis beer producers, including Lemp, a major lager brewer, went out of business.
Prohibition didn’t stop the Reds Rooters from carrying on a tradition of traveling to the city where the team played its first road series of the season. About 110 of them went by train from Cincinnati to St. Louis for the four-game set between the Reds and Cardinals April 22-25, 1925.
Beer and bratwurst
The Reds Rooters booked rooms at the elegant Hotel Statler at the corner of Washington Avenue and Ninth Street in downtown St. Louis. Built in 1917, Hotel Statler was the first air-conditioned hotel in the United States.
Another feature of the grand hotel was its 17th floor, which was designated for sample rooms used by traveling salesmen to display products. The Reds Rooters reserved the entire floor and converted it into a party clubhouse for their stay.
According to the St. Louis Post-Dispatch, the Reds Rooters brought with them “several kegs of sauerkraut, barrels of pickles and great quantities of sausages, pretzels and cheeses.”
That’s not all. To quench their thirst, the Cincinnatians also brought 25 half barrels of beer. Real beer.
An informant tipped off John Dyott, special assistant attorney general in charge of federal Prohibition cases, that the Reds Rooters were guzzling illegal brew. Dyott contacted federal law enforcement agents and ordered them to investigate.
At 1:30 p.m. on April 24, 1925, four agents arrived on the 17th floor, where they found 40 Reds Rooters about to leave for the ballpark, the Post-Dispatch reported. The Cincinnati group included Reds owner Garry Herrmann.
Down the drain
Orphaned at age 11, August Herrmann had worked as an errand boy filling salt stacks and then as a printer’s apprentice, where he got the nickname Garibaldi (shortened to Garry), according to the National Baseball Hall of Fame. He went into politics, becoming a Cincinnati city administrator, and rose to prominence with his creation of a modern waterworks system.
Herrmann was the life of any party. According to the Cincinnati Enquirer, “He was considered the greatest host in Cincinnati and he entertained his friends lavishly.”
In the raid on the Reds Rooters, agents found two half kegs of beer on tap and 11 more half kegs in an ice box waiting to be tapped, the Post-Dispatch reported. After taking samples for analysis, the agents poured all the brew down the drain.
Tests showed the beer had a 3.94 percent alcohol by volume (ABV) and qualified as illegal real beer, the St. Louis Star-Times reported. (Before Prohibition, a typical ABV for beer was 4.5 percent to 6 percent. In the early 1930s, a weaker, 3.2 percent beer gained prominence as a legal alternative in states that repealed dry laws before federal Prohibition ended.)
“We were under the impression that the stuff was near beer,” Herrmann told the Star-Times. “It was just an unfortunate mistake.”
Herrmann, five members of the Reds Rooters who were in charge of the arrangements, and two employees of the group were arrested on federal warrants charging possession of intoxicating alcohol. Herrmann posted a bond of $500 immediately after the warrant was served on him. A hearing in federal court in St. Louis was set back to the fall.
Costly pitchers
In October 1925, Herrmann led a contingent of Cincinnatians to Pittsburgh for the World Series between the Senators and Pirates. According to columnist Westbrook Pegler, when Herrmann arrived at Hotel Schenley, friends approached and asked, “Where are the kegs?” Herrmann replied, “Ever since that time they took the kegs away from the Cincinnati boys in St. Louis, I go without kegs.”
Later that month, Herrmann and the other defendants appeared for their hearing in the St. Louis courtroom of U.S. district judge Charles Breckenridge Faris, a former prosecutor who was appointed by President Woodrow Wilson in 1919.
Charges against Herrmann and the five members of the Reds Rooters were dismissed on the grounds that they were not in physical possession of beer when the agents raided the clubroom.
The two Reds Rooters employees, John Rosskopf and Leonard Schwab, who were in their shirt sleeves and wearing the aprons of bartenders when the agents came, pleaded guilty to charges of possession of alcohol. Each was fined $390.
According to testimony reported in the St. Louis newspapers, agents said they saw Rosskopf at a tapped keg with a foaming pitcher of beer in his hand and Schwab also had a pitcher filled with suds.
After the hearing, Herrmann told the Post-Dispatch, “We feel no malice toward St. Louis for our difficulties in this case. You can tell the world the Reds Rooters are still loyal. They’ll be back in the spring.”
RetroSimba 
What an absolute fascinating story, Mark, one that I hope one day is made into a movie….a sort of civil over over beer, just mind boggling and so relevant in today’s sort of civil war climate in America.
I’m reminded of my girl friend’s brother who always brings a 12 pack and flask with him wherever he goes and he’s the kindest soul, always filling up our cups when they become empty.
Here in Quebec there is a beer called Maudite which translates as “cursed” and is 8% alcohol and tastes good.
Excellent post Mark, one that inspires me to read more on the topic and of course raise up a beer toast later this afternoon to Herrmann. Have a great day!
Thanks, Steve. Sacrebleu! That Maudite packs quite a punch. I’d like to try that someday.
I wish we could send beer in the mail or in a future world, teleport a case!
Great piece, Mark. But I’m confused as to why they would harass a rich white man! Also, getting drunk on 3.94 is damn near impossible. lol
Thanks, Gary. Yep, the only ones to get punished were the two working stiffs, the hired bartenders, while the swells got off without consequences. Sounds like modern times, eh? According to the St. Louis newspapers, Garry Herrmann was represented by the lawyer who was retained by the Cardinals. The good ol’ boys network strikes again.
As a teen in Ohio in the 1970s, I remember well my buddies and I being able to get our hands easily on 3.2 beer. So I know what you mean (hiccup!) about the quantity it took to get a good buzz from that.
Gary Herrman must have been an amazing individual. That’s generally true of people who basically without the help of anyone made themselves into successful entrepreneurs. It’s really hard to imagine America without beer and alcohol! Sort of like Italy without wine.From what I’ve read Garry Herrman was instrumental in making the World Series an annual event. I don’t know if there’s any truth to this but I came across something that talked about one of Harry Carey’s restaurants that during the prohibition was a speakeasy that belonged to Al Capone. Why doesn’t that surprise me?
Holy cow! The world’s greatest beer salesman, Harry Caray, grew up in St. Louis during Prohibition. He later did a bang-up job making up for lost time.
The property and building that houses Harry Caray’s, the Chicago restaurant at 33 W. Kinzie in Chicago, has quite a history.
According to the Chicago Tribune, the original owner of the property, Alexander Wolcott Jr., was Chicago’s first doctor. The property was later bought by William B. Ogden, Chicago’s first mayor and owner of the city’s first brewery. The building later housed the law offices of Grant Goodrich, who practiced law with Abraham Lincoln, co-founded Northwestern University and was an advocate of the temperance movement.
According to the Tribune, during Prohibition the building was a speakeasy and was later owned by Frank Nitti, an associate of Al Capone. Harry Caray’s opened in 1987. According to the Tribune, over the years since that 1987 opening, the building has yielded many discoveries: a large safe found inside a wall; a secret room uncovered by an electrician drilling holes for wiring; a personal phone book hidden in a wall was uncovered by a carpenter; and in 2018 another safe belonging to Frank Nitti was discovered behind a bricked-up doorway.
Some things never change; two low-level associates took the fall. I am surprised to learn that major crime was so low in St. Louis at the time that the authorities could devote time and resources to this major caper.
That’s a very good point you make about authorities using valuable resources to go after a non-criminal group like that. As Mike Mitchell noted about Prohibition in his “Mr. Rickey’s Redbirds” book, “The government now had to spend millions every year on enforcement. It fought a losing battle from the start. The government hired 1,500 Prohibition agents to police the activities of 100 million people in a country with 3.5 million square miles of territory and 18,700 miles of coastlines and borders.”
According to Mitchell’s book, St. Louis had an estimated 1,000 speakeasies and another 14,000 “beer flats” that served home brew and other alcoholic drinks during Prohibition.
By the way, one of those federal Prohibition agents was Frank Rickey, brother of teetotaling Cardinals general manager Branch Rickey. As Mitchell wrote, “Working in Michigan, Frank Rickey served in the Prohibition enforcement wing of the U.S. Treasury Department.”
Afterward, Frank Rickey became a Cardinals scout and was credited with having a hand in the signings of Marty Marion, Terry Moore and Johnny Mize.
Can’t imagine they were the only ones prepping for game day with some not-so-near beer.
Yep, and with bellies full of sauerkraut to absorb it all, too.