Daniel Hessberg & The Faces of “Grandpa’s Rye”

Many pre-Prohibition whiskeys attempted to capture the public’s attention by the titles given to their products, often having little or nothing to do with the contents.  Because aged spirit were understood to be better than freshly minted booze, the word “Old” was the most common word to be affixed to the title of a brand.  But there were additional ways of getting the idea across.  “Old Methusalem” from Steinhardt Bros. conjured up the 969 year old Biblical character, as did “Old William Penn,” a century dead.  Daniel Hessberg of Mountain Distilling Company. in Cincinnati looked over the available names and chose “Gandpa’s Rye” as his flagship brand.  He advertised it with numerous representations of the venerable old gentleman.

While favoring “Grandpa’s Rye,” Hessberg hedged his merchandising bets by featuring more than a dozen proprietary brands in his liquor house.  They included:  "Gold Drip", "Golden Bell", "Grain Belt", "Hy-Lo Rye", "Imp. Export", "Imp. Monogram", "Kentucky Lily", "Liberty Belle", "Millstone", "Mountain Dew", "Old Ky. Mountain", "Old Ripple", and “Yukon.”  Hessberg was late in trademarking in total only four brands, registering “Grandpa’s Rye” in 1906, only after “Old Grand-Dad” had been registered in 1905 by the Hayden family.

The whiskey merchant seems to have paid particular attention to the faces given to “Grandpa.”  Nonetheless they differed from picture to picture.  Two versions were evident on the labels used by Hessberg.  The first, shown above, shows a young girl handing a glass of whiskey to the venerable gentleman who seems delighted to receive it.  The girl’s face is not as highly detailed as Grandpa who looks as if he might be sporting a white mustache.

As second label discloses a much more elaborated portrait of the couple. Both figures are more completely realized.  The girl is portrayed in detail including a frilly bow on her shoulder.   Grandpa seems to have lost the mustache but gained a large double chin.  Some have seen the image to indicate that Grandpa is not accepting the liquor but proffering it to the girl, clearly someone underage who could be his granddaughter.

Those labels would have been affixed to bottles of varying sizes from flasks to quarts, as shown above.  Hessberg also issued a “pinback” image of the label pair.  Those would have been given to customers as a form of advertising popular with many liquor dealers.  Here Grandpa is looking less intently at the girl and seems poised to accept the proffered glass.  The back discloses that the pin was made by the Whithead and Pogue Co. of Newark, N.J. 

Grandpa also was depicted in the base of shot glasses Hessberg distributed to wholesale and retail customers.  The glass shown on the left has a definitely different look than the pinback.  Here we have a “foxy” Grandpa with sparkling eyes and a knowing smile.  He may have some mischief in mind.  The glass at right returns him to the benign genial old gentleman.  The glass itself records that Grandpa’s Rye won a medal at the 1904 St. Louis World’s Fair, shown below right.

According to his 1894 passport, Daniel Hessberg was born in March 1850 in Berkach, a small town in an area of Germany known for its numerous Jewish residents.  Of his early life in Germany little is known but Daniel likely received the good education provided by the country’s exemplary school system.  At the age of 17 in 1867 Hessberg emigrated to the United States, possibly impelled by the prospect of being drafted into the Prussian Army, notorious for the high non-combat death rate among those conscripted.  

Hessberg embarked from Hamburg aboard the Steamship Allemannia, shown right, landing in New York.  From there he seemingly headed almost immediately for Cincinnati, a city with a large German population.  The next decade is shrouded in the mists of history but he almost certainly was employed in the bustling Queen City whiskey trade, learning the business.

Hessberg first surfaced in Cincinnati in 1879 when he established a wholesale and retail liquor outlet under his name at 10 East Second Street.  Indications are that he found early success, moving to larger quarters at 83 West Second Street by 1882 and to a third location at 14 East Pearl in 1889.  During this period Daniel found time to woo and win Sarah Stricker, the daughter of Simon and Camelia Stricker.  They married in November 1882 in Tiffin, Ohio. He was 32, She was 24.  They apparently would have no children.

Instead, according to the 1900 national census, at their large home at 840 Glenwood Avenue in Cincinnati, shown here, the couple were surrounded by a crowd of relatives.  Living with them were Sarah’s sister, Lotte, her husband  Henry Bohm, and their son, Abram. Add Sarah’s mother, Camelia, and Sarah’s brother, Ludwig Stricker.  Additionally three Indiana-born servant girls were resident, for a total of ten people under one commodious roof.  Bohm appears to have been working for Hessberg in the liquor store.

In 1889, Hessberg changed the name of his enterprise to “The Mountain Distilling Company,” the title under which “Grandpa’s Rye” would be merchandised on back-of-the bar-bottles and individual containers.  In 1894, he moved his liquor house to Cincinnati’s Third Road, settling first at 21 West Third, moving two years later to 223 East Third. His final destination in 1904 was 131 West Third.  The next 14 years were spent at that location until the company closed in 1918 after Ohio went “dry.”

Daniel Hessberg did not live to see the imposition of National Prohibition, dying in July 1913.  Follow his demise, other family members, likely led by Henry Bohm, continued the business until 1918 when Ohio adopted statewide Prohibition   Daniel’s wife, Sarah, lived another 22 years and was interred in Walnut Hill Cemetery, Cincinnati.  Her grave marker is shown here.  Daniel is recorded buried in the same cemetery but he apparently has no photographed gravestone.

Note:  This post has been written from a variety of Internet available sources but is missing important information about Daniel Hessberg’s life and activities. I am hoping that some alert relatives will see this post and help fill in the gaps.