Trost Brothers Brought “Good Cheer” to Louisville

 The Trost Brothers, William, Harry, and Isaac not only were among the more successful whiskey dealers among the dozens in Louisville, Kentucky, but evidently among those with the liveliest sense of humor.   The evidence is contained in the storage case seen below.   It is the backside of a leather trunk that that carries a greeting of “Good Cheer” and identifies “Trost Brothers, Wholesale Liquor Dealers,” as the perpetrators.   

Known as a “mechanical” trade card, the Trosts have prepared a surprise for their clientele who turn the image around and discover they now can manipulate it to provide them with something to cheer about:

And lo, a comely young woman is in the trunk, kicking up her heels to get out! “Good Cheer” whiskey lives up to its name.

The positive note struck by the trade card was in keeping with the Trost surname, which loosely translated from the German, traditionally was applied to individuals known for “cheering up” those needing comfort and consolation.  The Trosts had originated in Bavaria,  immigrating to America where Joseph Trost and his wife Sarah settled in Ohio and began raising a family.  Their firstborn, a son, William, was born in February 1861.  Over the next 20 years there would be seven more children. 

This growing family spurred Joseph, a jeweler, to move from Ohio with the family to Memphis, Tennessee.  When William was about seven Joseph made another change, and transported Sarah and six children from Memphis to Columbus, in Lowndes County, Mississippi.  This small town lies just over the Alabama border and has a large African American population and a history of racial tension and lynchings.   There William and his Trost siblings grew up.  

The 1880 federal census records William working in a local store.  Sometime over ensuing years, with younger brother, Harry, they struck out on their own, opening a liquor store in Columbus.  Although it apparently was successful, Mississippi was increasing going “dry.”  In July, 1893, the brothers decided to try their skills in Louisville, Kentucky, a city rapidly becoming the center of American whiskey marketing.  William became president;  Harry, secretary-treasurer.When he reached maturity, Isaac Trost would join his brothers in the liquor house, initially working as a traveling salesman.

Opening their business at 125-127 Third Street, the Trosts featured a number of house brands, leading off with “Good Cheer” and including, "Elgin Club,” “Havsum,” "High Grade,” "M L Howard,” "Si Gordon,” “Sultana,” and “Walton.”   In a city that was teeming with competing whiskey brands, Trost trademarked Elgin Club, Havsum, High Grade, and Sultana in 1905, after the laws had been strengthened by Congress.  Inexplicably, Good Cheer was not protected until 1906.

Packaging for Trost liquor that I have been able to find is all of the flask variety, half-pints and pints.  Shown here are two of the smaller bottles, half pints, one clear and the other purpled.  As always when one of the purpled variety is discovered, the question becomes whether the item has been colored artificially by some enterprising collector.  

Although the Trosts claimed to be distillers they actually were “rectifiers,” buying whiskeys by the barrel from one or more distilleries and mixing it to achieve desired taste and smoothness.  A Louisville publication was quick to praise the Trosts’ efforts, claiming: “Their trade extends throughout the South and East, amounting to $100,000 annually.” [More than $2 million in today’s dollar.]  “The firm’s special brands, Good Cheer, Elgin Club and Sultana, have been received with high favor by leading connisseurs everywhere.”  

The Trosts also specialized in providing their wholesale and good retail customers with shot glasses advertising their brands.  Most glasses featured the owners’ names and “Louisville,” increasingly being recognized as the whiskey capitol of America.  Other Trost liquor labels memorialized by shot glasses were “High Grade” and “Elgin Club,”  shown here.  “Elgin Club” also was represented by a Trost “back-of-the-bar” bottle.

Meanwhile William was having a personal life.  In October 1890, he married Sarah Selig, a local girl, in Columbus.  At the time of their nuptials he was 29, she was 19.  Records indicate that they had only one child, Milton Samuel Trost, born in 1894, a year after the family arrived in Louisville.  In the 1910 census, William, 39, was recorded as head of a household that included wife Sarah, young Milton, William’s younger brother Isaac, Sarah’s sister Fannie, and two 27-year-old female servants — a total of seven residents.  They made their home in an attractive house at 2160 Barringer Avenue, shown here as it looks today.

By this time Harry Trost, a bachelor, had died at the early age of 38 at home in Mississippi where he apparently had gone to recuperate from illness, the cause not disclosed.  Harry’s place was taken by brother Isaac Trost, who remained a bachelor,  During those years Trost Brothers twice changed business addresses.  In 1909 apparently needing larger quarters their liquor house moved to 131 North Third Road.  A final change occurred in 1916 when the company moved to121 West Main Street. This address was on Louisville’s famed “Whiskey Row,” shown below, a sign that the Trosts had “arrived” among the liquor nobility of Louisville.

The Trosts' climb to Whiskey Row, however, was destined to be short-lived.  Only a year later they were forced to shut their doors by prohibitionary pressures.  The Louisville 1920 census recorded both men now engaged in other occupations.  William was an officer in a manufacturing company;  Isaac was listed as a wholesaler.  A decade later in the 1930 census William, now 69, listed as an insurance broker; Isaac, 62, was recorded an “agent.” 

William died in December 1943, as he approached 83 years.  According to death records, he died of a heart attack at Louisville’s Jewish Hospital after a short illness. William was buried in the Trost plot in Louisville’s Adath Israel Cemetery.  His wife, Sarah, followed four years later.  

The Trosts were remembered as  participants in the Louisviie business community  and active  members of the National Wine and Spirits Association, further evidence that brothers coming from a small town in Mississippi could “make it” in the big city as  Kentucky whiskey barons.  

Note:  The Trost Bros. story was gathered from a number of Internet sources. They included an unusually large number of illustrations of liquor artifacts including the unusual “mechanical” trade card that opens this post, an item seemingly unique to the Trost Louisville liquor house.  Unfortunately, photos of William and his brothers were not found but my hope is that a relative may see this post and be able to supply them.

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