Whiskey Men as Judges

Foreword:  Although it was not a common occupation for a distiller, liquor dealer, saloon keeper or bartender, several whiskey men spent time “on the bench” dispensing, one presumes, justice to the people of their town or county.  Here are the stories of three individuals who found themselves in the judging game, each with a distinct story of how he ascended to the job.

William Harrison McBrayer, called Judge McBrayer for much of his life, is credited with being among the handful of Kentucky distillers who raised the quality and image of the state’s whiskey to international renown. One contemporary account says of his Cedar Creek brand: “It was the whiskey that made the crowned heads of Europe turn from Scotch to bourbon.”

McBrayer was born in Anderson County, Kentucky, in 1821, one of 11 children from a pioneer family. His grandfather had been early settler in the Bluegrass State. His father, a farmer and politician, probably ran a small still on his land. Educated in Anderson County schools, McBrayer early showed a talent for business.  There is no evidence, however, as a youth he studied the law other than inheriting his father’s taste for politics.

When Kentucky became a state the thirty-year-old McBrayer was quick to see an opportunity, ran for Anderson County judge, was elected, and served four years, earning a title he carried with him the rest of his life.  The quality of his service on the bench has gone largely unrecorded but clearly was good enough that when the now Judge McBrayer ran for the Kentucky State Senate, he was elected, serving a four year term.

Apparently tiring of politics, McBrayer began to give serious attention to a small distillery he had operated on Cedar Creek. He greatly expanded the facility, constructing a new frame building to hold the still, three ironclad warehouses with metal roofs and a number of outbuildings. The photograph above shows the site.  With this expansion McBrayer concentrated on making a high quality whiskey, he called Cedar Brook, and marketed it widely. Its success was swift, aided by winning first prize and a gold medal for whiskey at the Philadelphia Centennial Exposition of 1876.

After more than 30 years at the helm of his distillery, McBrayer, at age 67, died. Among the many accolades accorded him was this one from a local newspaper: "Judge McBrayer was endowed with a noble mind, a clear, far-seeing brain and a strong, generous heart. Whether as a judge on the bench, as a legislator in the State Senate, as a merchant, a cattle dealer, or as a distiller, he put forth the best there was in him - it was ever his own and desire to treat everyone fairly and do justice to everybody.”

The story of Lazard Coblentz could not be more different. He was born in 1852 in the sleepy village of Lixheim in the Lorraine region of Northeastern France, near the German border.  When France and Prussia went to war in 1870,  Prussia captured Lixheim and attempted to conscript into its army male residents of eligible age.  As a result, according to a family history, twenty one Coblentz men, a mixture of brothers and cousins, left for the New World, scattering out across North, Central and South America.

Lazard, age 20, headed for California, arriving in the state about 1871.  His early years are shrouded in time but he is recorded in 1880 living in a California mining town known as “Pokerville” (eventually named Plymouth), located in Amador County.  What remains of the town has been preserved as a tourist site. There Coblentz opened a general store, with liquor as a major commodity.  Despite his status as an immigrant, of Jewish ancestry, and speaking accented English, the young man clearly impressed the residents of Pokerville.  The residents elected him town judge.

When a post office building was erected, a rear section was designated as a courtroom.  One observer has written that the chambers were “fitted out with all necessary conveniences for cinching offenders or bleeding litigants, with jury seats, attorneys’ and reporters’ tables, and above all, an imposing pulpit for his Honor,  Judge Coblentz.”

As the mines petered out and Pokerville/Plymouth declined, Coblentz became restless.  In 1888, with his family and brother-in-law Ike Levy in tow, he pulled up stakes and followed his star north to Portland, Oregon, a city that was experiencing an economic surge.  There, under the company name, Coblentz & Levy, the pair opened a wholesale liquor business at 166 Second Street.  

The partners featured their own brands, probably “rectified” blends mixed on their own property.   Appropriately their flagship was “North Star Old Kentucky Bourbon.”   Other brands were “Old Private Stock” and “Black Diamond.”  The quality of their whiskey was brought to a larger audience in 1905 with the opening of the Lewis and Clark Exposition, a major event held in Portland that drew visitors from many parts of the country.  Coblentz prospered until Oregon voted statewide Prohibition in 1914 and then was forced to shut the doors of his liquor house.

The federal census caught up Coblentz in 1920, age 68 and his whiskey business six years gone.  He gave his occupation to the census taker as “macaroni salesman.”  I detect more than a modicum of sarcasm in his response,  appropriate for someone who had ventured in life as far as he had.

One of the true legendary characters of the Old West was Judge Roy Bean, who called himself the “only justice west of the Pecos.” Much has been written about Bean, shown here, and he has been the subject of motion pictures and television programs — most of the depictions fanciful.  What is not exaggerated was his lifelong occupation running saloons, including one in Langtry, Texas.

Bean’s establishment did a brisk business as did other local saloons, giving rise to unrest and lawlessness.  Railroad executives, tiring of frequent robberies, requested the Texas Rangers to bring order to the site and a detachment was sent.  Their commander reported:  “There is the worst lot of toughs, gamblers, robbers and pickpockets collected here I ever saw.”  Compounding the problem was a lack of any court of justice within 200 miles.  The Rangers put out a call for the appointment of a justice of the peace for the region.   Roy Bean applied and was appointed.

As shown above, it was from the front porch of his saloon that Bean dispensed justice.  In the photo here, note that he is sitting on a barrel, wearing a sombrero, under signs that proclaim him “Judge Roy Bean Notary Public - Justice of the Peace - Law West of the Pecos.”  The men on horseback at left are said to comprise a prisoner awaiting trial and his captors.

A replica of the bar area on display at the Whitehead Memorial Museum in Del Rio, Texas, displays a grizzled Bean serving drinks to a cowboy and a miner.  Above his head are books, replicas of the outmoded compendium of Texas laws on which Judge Bean reputedly based his legal decisions. 

As a result of his colorful career, many stories have grown up around Judge Bean.  Some have called him a “hanging judge.”  Others aver that over his career in office he never hanged anyone, arranging for the condemned to escape.  Some dismiss him only as foul-mouth bully, drunk and gambler.  Others counter that he was a generous benefactor, using the fines he levied and even some of the profits of his saloon to buy medicine for the sick and poor of Langtry.  

Roy Bean died in March, 1903.  After a night of heavy drinking he returned to Langtry in the morning and was stricken, passing away that night.  Some say he had lost the will to live, fearing that developments in Texas meant that the Old West of his ascendancy was disappearing and the times were passing him by.  Today Judge Bean lies buried on the grounds of the Whitehead Museum.

NOTE:  More complete posts on each of these whiskey men judges may be found on this blog:  W.H. McBrayer, October 2, 2011; Lazard Coblentz, January 18, 2013; and Roy Bean, October 4, 2016.