When I was a reporter on a weekly newspaper in the Wisconsin North Woods in 1958, my boss Dan, a jokester, loved to regale visiting hunters in local bars just as deer season began. He would tell the outsiders, “I never go out in the field hunting without a few belts of whiskey in me to keep warm.” Then he would watch with amusement at the looks of alarm on the faces of those in town expecting to hunt on opening day.
Although I think Dan was only kidding, the juxtaposition of whiskey with hunting was a familiar theme in liquor ads before National Prohibition. Whiskey advertising frequently extolled the value of strong drink for hunters or found other ways of identifying their product with the shooters’ sport. In the saloon sign above, advertising Kinsey Pure Rye Whiskey, we see a story unfolding. The hunter and his dog have intruded on posted “No Trespassing” land, only to confront an angry farmer with rod in his hand. The hunter is offering a flask — obviously of Kinsey Rye — and the farmer seems about to take it. Moral: Whiskey is handy to have on a hunt.
The pre-Prohibition Angelo Myers Co. of Philadelphia was not the only liquor wholesaler to make use of this “Field and Stream” fantasy. Old Overholt, a long-produced Pennsylvania Rye Whiskey, founded as early as 1810, used a similar theme on one of its advertising signs given to saloons. The “No Trespassing” sign is absent here, but the farmer carries a stick. He seems pleased, however, at being offered a swig from a flask of Old Overholt. In the distance a bearded yokel is climbing a fence to get his share. Given the angled posture of the hunter, he may have been imbibing earlier.
“A Stag Party” is a saloon sign meant to be humorous, issued by the George Stagg Company of Frankfort, Kentucky. Here two hunters are resting from their labors, toasting each other with whiskey from a bottle of Stagg’s trademarked “O.F.C. Straight Bourbon.” Both are unaware that a large male deer with a huge antler rack has appeared out of the forest behind them. That buck was the emblem of the O.F.C. distillery that Stagg operated. The younger hunter also seems unaware that his rifle, resting as it is on his arm, might go off and damage more than his snazzy jacket.
A scene of gunners resting and enjoying a drink, guns close by, also decorated the labels of “Kamp’s Rye Whiskey.” In this scene the two hunters apparently have spent the day in the field and shot something tough and stringy — perhaps a wild boar — since they seem to be making dinner by boiling what they bagged over a blazing wood fire. The only camper who seems to be paying attention is their dog. The source of this whiskey, Kamp Distilling of St. Louis, was not a distiller, but a wholesaler who “rectified” whiskey purchased elsewhere, mixing and blending it, sometimes with other ingredients, to achieve taste and color, then bottling it under a proprietary label.
This theme of two hunters relaxing in camp with their dog and guns was replicated in a saloon sign issued by the company. Calling this brand of whiskey “The Sportman’s Choice,” Kamp indicated by this illustration that the hunters were well supplied with whiskey, a full case of quart bottles being evident in the foreground. It is a wonder these gents could find time between snorts to do any hunting at all.
“Rod and Gun Club Rye,” ads and labels, unlike those above, do not show any overt drinking. Here the man and his dogs seemingly have flush a pair of snipes and a covey of quail. The hunter seems in a quandary, as do his dogs, about which birds to shoot. With the first shot, all will be in flight. Miller & Mooney began business about 1884 in Philadelphia as liquor wholesalers. They likely experienced frustration in getting adequate whiskey supplies and so bought their own distillery in nearby Berks County, Pennsylvania. It was the Wheatland Distillery, operating under the “bottled in bonding” legislation and known in Federal annals as Registered Distillery #75 in the 1st District of Pennsylvania.
John Ellwanger, a German immigrant who began his career as a delivery boy in a Dubuque, Iowa, dry goods store, and went on to become a wealthy whiskey wholesaler, featured a hunter in his sign for “Old Knapsack Rye.” Given the startled look on the face of nimrod, my guess is that he has a flask in his own knapsack and has been reminded to take a swig. Ellwanger used his resources from selling whiskey to become a leading business and political figure in Dubuque during the late 19th Century and into the 20th.
Theobold & Son of Columbus, Ohio, left little to the imagination by their saloon sign for their flagship brand, “Old Coon Sour Mash. Above is the image of two hunters in the twilight with coon dogs who have treed a small raccoon that is looking at them intently, obviously with some apprehension. The hunters, however, seem transfixed on a bottle of whiskey that one of the men is offering the other. The dogs seem disinterested in the quarry. It may be that Old Coon has saved the hide of the treed version. The Theobolds were in business from 1860 to 1916 when Ohio voted to go “dry.”
The label of the “Off & On” whiskey appears to show a hunter who is in no quandary about what to aim at. Crouched on the forest floor, he is intently banging away at his unseen quarry. This was one of many brands from the Herman Myer Company of New York City. Like other wholesalers Myer was rectifying and bottling whiskey under his own labels. One of my favorite Myer brand names is “Naked Mermaid.” Herman apparently was getting supplies from a relative with a distillery in Covington, Kentucky.
These nine pre-Prohibition whiskey ads provide ample testimony to the links that have existed from time immemorial between alcohol and hunting — a relationship as fresh as the present. The moral is: If you don’t have a gun, stay out of the woods during hunting season — and maybe even if you do.
Note: More complete narratives about several of the “whiskey men” referenced here may be found elsewhere on this website: Theobold, April 2, 2011; Ellwanger, Feb. 26, 2012; Overholt, July 2, 2012, and Stagg, April 30, 2016.
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