For most of the 19th Century, the center of the American liquor trade was Cincinnati, Ohio. Close to Kentucky and Pennsylvania, two major distilling states, and a major national hub for river and railroad traffic, the so-called “Queen City” was home to hundreds of distillers, rectifiers (blenders), wholesale and retail liquor dealers. Among them was the Hegner clan — three generations encompassing six decades in the whiskey trade.
The Hegner saga began with the arrival of Johan Hegner in the United States in 1843. Born in Germany in1823, Johan at the age of 20, was said to be “like thousands of ambitious young men of the old country, determined to seek his fortune in America.” He also may have been trying to avoid being conscripted into the Prussian military. Johan is shown here as depicted on a Hegner grave monument.
Johan appears to have had some experience in his homeland with the distilling trades. He early headed to Cincinnati with its strong German population and lively liquor industry. There Johan is credited with being a pioneer distiller and yeast manufacturer. “He furnished stock yeast to the distilleries of this city and the tributary territory for many years,” noted a Hegner biographer.
In Cincinnati, Johan met and about 1847 married Catherine Kuespert, a child of immigrant parents. She was three years his junior They would have three children, Anna Barbara, born in 1848; Margaretha, 1854, and Gottfried, 1855. Shown here as depicted on the grave monument, Catherine died in 1879 at the age of 54. The couple is buried in the Hegner plot in Cincinnati’s Spring Grove Cemetery.
Johan lived until 1904, long enough to help educate his son in the whiskey trade. Gottfried had attended public schools until reaching 12 years and then went to work in the distilling business, serving apprenticeships in Cincinnati and Terre Haute, Indiana. In 1875, the young man returned to Cincinnati and gained employment as a bookkeeper with William Fuller & Co., a wholesale dealership and whiskey rectifier. This was a highly responsible position because of the need to keep careful track of the federal taxes owed. Federal agents particularly targeted tax cheating on rectified whiskey. The penalty was stiff and could include jail time.
At William Fuller & Co. Gottfried met Augustus Kayser, Fuller’s junior partner in the liquor house. Born in Germany, Kayser was seven years older and an established personage in the Cincinnati liquor trade. The two men became friends and eventually Gottfried introduced him to his older sister, Anna Barbara. The two fell in love and were married, bringing Kayser firmly into the Hegner family fold.
In 1878 Fuller dissolved his firm leaving Kayser and Gottfried’s free to organize their own liquor business. They founded it that same year as Kayser & Hegner Company. Augustus was president and Gottfried secretary. Their first address was 86 East Second Street (1878-1883) and subsequent larger quarters over a span of 40 years all were located on East Second.
In February 1879, Gottfried met and in Cincinnati married Annie E. F. Lachtrop, the daughter of a well known local tavern keeper, the proprietor of Eight Mile House, located on the Lexington and Covington turnpike. Growing up in the roadhouse atmosphere Annie was well attuned to her husband’s occupation. The couple would have three children, Harry born 1880 , Fred, 1883, and Pearl, 1886.
Kayser & Hegner featured a number of proprietary “house” brands. They included “Red Hen,” "Avondale Club,” "Belle of Washington,” "Moscow Rye.” "Selby Run,” "Small Still,” "T. P. A,” and "Yacht Club.” In 1887 the partners registered Yacht Club, their flagship brand, with the Patent and Trademark Office. When Congress strengthened copyright laws in 1905, they re-registered the name and added Avondale, Belle of Washington, and Selby Run. As shown here Kayser & Hegner bottled their whiskey in both ceramic and glass.
From the outset the partner’s exhibited a strong sense of merchandising. They provided their customers in saloons, hotels and restaurants with well crafted signs advertising their whiskey. At left is a Kayser & Hegner gifted sign of a smiling boy done in the Dutch or German realistic genre. In an era when depictions of female nudity were common in drinking establishments, this picture was suitable for display in finer settings where women were invited. Below is a second example of the company advertising. This saloon sign celebrates Yacht Club as well as two other Kayser & Hegner brands. Although the central focus is on two sailboats, look to the left, very small, is a line of battleships, suggesting a wartime dating.
As was common then in the liquor trade, the partners also gifted their customers with decorative shot glasses. Those would be distributed to both wholesale and retail patrons. Not expensive to make, those glasses were virtually indestructible and capable of being used over and over. Today advertising shot glasses find an avid collector base willing to spend a high dollar figure for particular pieces.
Kayser & Hegner did a vigorous business throughout the Middle West by sending salesmen out on the road. They would be announced by imaginative post cards, often including the proposed date of the visit, as on the card below. The company tried to make them as interesting as possible with illustrations. The card at left serves to introduce the third in the line of Hegners in the whiskey trade, Henry Hegner, who began in the business as a traveling salesman for Kayser & Hegner.
As he advanced into his 60s, Augustus Kayser ’s health faltered. Earlier he had been highly active, running the liquor house and making a name as an inventor. He owned patents on “Improvements in Low Water Alarms for Steam-Generators” (1871) and “Improvement in Low Water Alarms for Steam Boilers” (1972). His wealth allowed him to house his wife Barbara and children, Augustus Jr. and Luella, in a spacious home at 1710 Kinney Avenue in Cincinnati, shown here.
Augustus was living there amid his family when in September 1910, he died and was buried in the Hegner family plot. Gottfried had taken over the management of Kayser & Hegner a year earlier. Said a biographer: “Having early gained thorough knowledge of his business, Mr. Hegner applied himself with great diligence and has won high standing among the distillers and wholesale dealers of the country….Possessing a generous and kindly nature, he is a liberal contributor to worthy causes.…”
With the help of Henry, promoted to management, the Hegners prospered even as the noose of Prohibition tightened around the liquor industry. The family finally conceded, closing down their establishment in 1918. Gottfried would live another 12 years, succumbing in August 1930 at the age of 75. He was buried in the Hegner plot adjacent to the monument to Johann and Catherine and near wife Annie and son Henry, both of whom had preceded him in death. In Cincinnati, home to a multitude of liquor establishments, the Hegner/Kayser clan had made its mark.
Notes: This post relies heavily for information from ancestry.com and the biographies of Johann and Gottfried Hegner in the volume, “The Queen City, 1788-1912,” Vol. III, Clark Publishing, 1912.
No comments:
Post a Comment