Foreword: As regulars to this website know, from time to time I include the work of a “guest” author whose work I have run across doing my own research. In his new book, “Whiskey Makers in Washington D.C., A Pre-Prohibition History,” attorney and whiskey producer Troy Hughes provides a view of the liquor trade in the Nation’s Capital during the early 1900s. The book is well worth reading and Troy graciously has allowed me to reprint one of his chapters here as evidence.
James Charles McGuire was a liquor merchant that made the Mount Pleasant neighborhood his home. Born in Washington, D.C. in 1875, he graduated from Georgetown University in 1896. By late 1903, he formed a partnership with John F. Monaghan and opened a liquor store named “Monaghan and McGuire” at 621 Seventh Street NW. Their flagship brand was Federal Seal Rye. The partnership was very short-lived and by the time the ads shown below ran in June 1904, Monaghan had already left the partnership.
Once their wholesale supplier Rosskam, Gerstley and Company saw how successful their store was, the wholesaler wanted a larger share of the profit. Gertstley induced Monaghan to withdraw from the partnership with McGuire to become an employee of Rosskam, Gerstley and Company. In executing his plan, Gerstley also claimed that the former partnership owed him a $5,000 payment on a bond the partnership used to secure the purchase of alcohol.
When the case went to court in the Supreme Court of the District of Columbia, December 10, 1904, a judgment was obtained against Monaghan. He admitted that the debt was due to the wholesaler. McGuire appealed the decision, first to the Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia, where he again lost, and finally to the Supreme Court of the United States. The case McGuire v. Gerstley, 204 U.S. 489, was decided on February 25, 1907. Associate Justice Rufus Peckham, writing for the Court, affirmed the decision of the Court of Appeals below; making McGuire a three-time loser in the Judicial Branch.
Despite this rough start, McGuire went on to become a successful liquor merchant with his store located at 519 9th Street NW. An ad from the December 24, 1905, Washington Post shows that McGuire was now the “Sole Distributor” of Federal Seal Rye and that: “Uncle Sam Inspects Every Barrel and Guarantees Its Purity.” And also, that the bottles came, “Direct from DISTILLERY to YOU. Straight Rye, 7 years old. One Dollar Per Full Quart.” This ad indicates that, at least in 1905, Federal Seal Rye was claimed to be a straight whiskey that was bottled-in-bond. In 1913, he was the Secretary for the Retail Liquor Dealer’ Association (the same organization headed by William Barry of Mount Pleasant Club Whiskey). In 1914, McGuire was appointed as a teller for the Washington D.C. Chamber of Commerce.
An avid Washington Nationals fan, McGuire led a prominent Booster Club of 28 individuals, who from time to time would collect, pool and present money to show fan appreciation for certain team members. One such special occasion was mentioned in the July 24, 1913, in The Washington Times under the headline, “ORDER IS PLACED FOR JOHNSON CUP – Anniversary Gift From Capital Fans Will Stand Forty Inches High, and Is a Magnificent Piece of Work – Now Up to the Fans to Fill Trophy to Brim with Money”. McGuire’s Booster Club was listed, along with eight other clubs that raised a total of $605.97 that was presented to ace pitcher Walter Perry “The Big Train” Johnson on August 2, 1913, to mark his six-year anniversary with the Nationals.
Johnson started with the Nationals in 1907 and spent his entire career with the team. He was by far the greatest player to ever wear a uniform for a baseball team in Washington. He was one of the original five players inducted into the Hall of Fame when it opened its doors in 1936. Considered one of the most dominant pitchers of all time, he won the pitching Triple Crown (Wins, Strike Outs and Earned Run Average) three times (1913, 1918 and 1924). He was also named the American League’s Most Valuable Player twice (1913 and 1924).
Johnson ended up living only a few blocks away from McGuire in the Mount Pleasant neighborhood, first at the Kenesaw Apartment House at the corner of 16th and Irving (formerly Kenesaw) Streets in 1915, and then at 1843 Irving Street until 1925. When flush with the money he had earned from taking the Nationals to the 1924 World Series, he bought a house on Old Georgetown Road, Bethesda, Maryland.
After Prohibition came to Washington, D.C. in 1917, McGuire closed his liquor store and played an active role in the Al Smith Club of Washington, D.C. Al Smith was a four-time Governor of New York, who in 1923 signed legislation repealing the state’s prohibition statute, leaving enforcement to the federal government. Smith became the Democratic candidate for the President of the United States in 1928. In February 1928, McGuire was appointed as a member on a three-person committee to find a permanent headquarters for the campaign. In June 1928, he was listed as a candidate for the central committee in the Democratic primary for Washington, D.C.
A question on the ballot read, “Do you favor national representation for the people of the District of Columbia in the Congress of the United States and in the Electoral College?”. It seems things in Washington, D.C. politics never change. Smith, a Catholic went on to lose the election soundly to Herbert Hoover, in part because the Temperance Movement made much of his religion — claiming that the Pope would be giving Smith orders.
McGuire died at his home at 3204 19th Street NW in Mount Pleasant on August 31, 1938 and was given a requiem mass at Shrine of the Sacred Heart Church in the neighborhood. He was buried at the Mount Olivet Cemetery. One of McGuire’s bottles was found sealed in a wall across the street from where he lived. Interestingly, the label provides that the contents of the bottles was a “BLEND,” that indicates McGuire either switched sources for his whiskey – leaving behind the claim of it being aged seven years and a straight whiskey, or he just relabeled the existing whiskey truthfully to comply with the Pure Food and Drug Act of 1906.
Note: Troy Hughes’ book contains 175 pages of interesting historical information, including an excellent narrative on how American whiskey became to be defined by President Taft, a definition that has stood to the present day. The book can be ordered as Whiskey Makers in Washington, D.C.: A Pre-Prohibition History by Troy Hughes | The History Press Books (arcadiapublishing.com) or by calling 843-853-2070.
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