Whiskey Men Who Began as Draymen

Foreword:  Although the word “drayman” today usually describes only brewery deliverymen, historically a drayman was the driver of a dray, a low, flat-bed wagon without sides, pulled by horses or mules, that transported a range of goods, including barrels of whiskey.  Some individuals who came to own major distilleries and liquor houses began their careers in the whiskey trade by driving a dray. The stories of four of them follow.

William McRoberts, an immigrant from Ireland who settled in Cincinnati about 1853, landed a job as a drayman for a local wholesale liquor house known as Boyle, Miller & Company.  In this role McRoberts became a cog in the “Underground Railroad,” smuggling escaping slaves to freedom in the North and safety in Canada.  A key to freedom was escaping the borders of slave states; crossing the Ohio River was a major objective.  Ohio was the closest state to Canada with only about 250 miles from the Kentucky border to Lake Erie and safety.

People who guided slaves from place to place were called “conductors.”  McRoberts was a conductor with excellent opportunities.   Among his duties was traveling by horse and wagon over the Ohio River to distilleries in Kentucky and bringing barrels of whiskey back to Cincinnati.  On his return McRoberts would halt his team at an isolated spot and another conductor would help him load a slave, or perhaps two, into whiskey barrels that he would cart back across the river and offload at the distillery. After dark the escapees would be spirited north to another “station” on the way to Canada.

My assumption is that the distillery owners were aware of the scheme and approved.  All were taking a risk. If discovered, the distillery would have had its wagon, horses and cargo confiscated.  McRoberts would have faced fines, jail, and possible physical harm.  Never caught, the Irishman eventually took over Boyle Miller, and rose to become a notable American distiller.  Crushed in a train accident, McRoberts died in January 1876 at the age of 52.

Another Irish immigrant who rose from hauling whiskey barrels to running his own distillery was Arthur McGinnis of Baltimore.   McGinnis’ intelligence and “go getter” attitude as a drayman brought him to the attention of John B. Brown, the owner of a successful liquor outfit Brown had founded in 1869.  

After hiring McGinnis as a driver in the mid-1880’s Brown brought him inside and taught him the liquor business. By 1895 the name of the firm had become Brown, McGinnis & Company.  McGinnis’s three sons -- John, James and Patrick -- all became involved in the business. Brown’s name eventually disappeared entirely and the A. McGinnis Company of Baltimore emerged. 

McGinnis reorganized the company and invested $5,000. With the new infusion of funds McGinnis built a distillery adjacent to the Western Maryland Railroad at a place located four miles from Westminster, Maryland, that came to be known as McGinnis Siding,  McGinnis corporate offices remained in Baltimore, first at 208 Lexington Av. and then in the American Building downtown, shown here.   After Arthur died in 1905 his sons carried on the distillery.  

Being a drayman for a wholesale liquor dealer in the late 1800s was a highly difficult and taxing job. He was required to manage a team of horses hauling a large wagon filled with barrels of whiskey and heavy crates that he usually was required to load and unload by himself.  Benjamin F. Hollenbach was such a driver and he ultimately drove himself into the ownership of the Reading, Pennsylvania, whiskey house for which he labored. 

Born in Pennsylvania and given only an elementary education, Hollenbach was seventeen when he arrived in Reading and was hired as a driver by George W. Hughes who owned a wholesale liquor business founded in 1869.  Hughes saw potential in young Benjamin as someone who handled his responsibilities with a maturity that belied his age.  Before long he brought the youth into the store as a clerk.  

Two years later Hughes died and his son-in-law R. H. Jones took over management of the firm.  Not long after, however, Jones also died.   Hughes’ widow was left with a business to run and she turned to the trusted clerk.  Still in his early 20’s,  Ben Hollenbach took over running the firm.   For four years he managed the liquor dealership for the widow under Hughes name.  As the company prospered Ben saved his money and in 1900, with a partner, he bought her out and became the co-owner and senior partner.  The business now became Hollenbach & Dietrich and the flagship brand, "Social Rye."

The company proved to be a highly prosperous enterprise.   A contemporary account noted the following:   “The firm...does a large business, handling nothing but the finest wines and whiskies, and they are the proprietors of the well known ‘Social Rye,’ handled by the trade all over the country.”  At the time of his death in 1915 Hollenbach had become recognized throughout the region for his business acumen and his leadership in fraternal and social organizations. 

Born on a farm in 1850 in Wayland, New York, John Rauberhad limited formal education.  Farm life apparently had little or no appeal and at sixteen in 1866 he gravitated the fifty miles to Rochester.  There Rauber found work as a drayman for the Rau Brewery.  According to a biographer:  “Active and diligent he won the esteem of his employers and gained promotion from time to time with a corresponding increase of wage that at length enabled him to save a sufficient amount to engage in business on his own account.” 

With the arrival of his brother, Peter, in Rochester the two youths almost immediately launched a liquor house called P. F. Rauber & Bro.  According to a 1918 History of Rochester and Monroe County:  “From the beginning the new enterprise proved a profitable one — a fact which was due to the excellence of their product and also to the fact that they were ever found reliable and trustworthy in business transactions.”  

After 18 years as co-owner of the Rauber liquor house in April 1896 Peter died at the early age of 38, leaving a young widow and three minor children.  With his brother's death, John Rauber became the sole proprietor of the liquor firm and changed its name to his own.  He lived only an additional sixteen months, dying in August 1897 at the age of 47. His eldest son took over management of the business.

With John Rauber’s death came warm tributes in his memory.  The former drayman was hailed as an individual who had made many friends in both the business and social world and was particularly known as a benefactor of the children of Rochester.  One encomium ended:  “In matters of citizenship he was progressive and public spirited and gave active support to many measures for the public good. It is thus that the community lost a citizen it had learned to value.” 

With only limited education and few resources each of these men began their careers driving a horse and wagon. By dint of intelligence and hard work each rose to prominence because of their leadership in the liquor trade.  While managing successful enterprises, these former draymen also played significant roles in their communities and were acknowledged for their positive influence on their times.

Note:  More complete profiles of each of these four whiskey men can be found elsewhere on this website:  William McRoberts, November 19, 2016; Arthur McGinnis, August 25, 2011; Benjamin Hollenbach, March 18, 2013; and John Rauber, February 12, 2017.  

Ben Hollenbach’s Drive to Success

 Being a driver for a wholesale liquor dealer in the late 1800s was a highly difficult and taxing job.  Before the advent of the automobile, the driver was required to manage a team of horses hauling a large wagon filled with huge barrels of whiskey and heavy crates he usually loaded and unloaded by himself.  Benjamin F. Hollenbach was such a driver and he ultimately drove himself into the ownership of the Reading, Pennsylvania, company for which he toiled.

 

Born in January 1871 in Slatington, a small east central Pennsylvania town in Lehigh County, Hollenbach was the son of a Civil War veteran.  He was educated in the public schools of Slatington, likely a one-room school house.  We may speculate that he early had experience with the elaborate harnessing, driving and care of horses.  At an early age Ben ended his book learning to find work.  At the age of 17 in 1888 he arrived in Reading,  Pennsylvania.  There he was hired as a driver by George W. Hughes.  With a partner Hughes had started a wholesale liquor dealership in 1869,  located at 805 Penn Street, a major thoroughfare shown here in an early post card view.  He became the sole owner of the business in 1877.

Hughes obviously saw potential in the young Hollenbach as someone who handled his responsibilities with a maturity that belied his age.  Before long he brought the youth into the store as a clerk.  Two years later Hughes died and his son-in-law R. H. Jones took over management of the firm.  Not long after, however, Jones also died.   Hughes’ widow was left with a business to run and she turned to the trusted clerk.  Still in his early 20’s,  Ben Hollenbach took over running the firm.   For four years he managed the liquor dealership for the widow under Hughes name.  As the company prospered Ben saved his money and in 1900, with a partner,  he bought out the widow and became the co-owner and senior partner of the company.

His partner was Howard Dietrich,  a Reading druggist and businessman. One year older than Hollenbach, Dietrich was was from an established Pennsylvania family, married with five children, four sons and a daughter.  By this time Hollenbach also had married.  His wife was the former Carrie Sieger of Shoemakersville in Berks County.  They had one child, Florence, born in 1894.

The partners renamed the firm, Hollenbach, Dietrich & Co.  In buying the business they also acquired the Penn Street building.  It became the permanent home of the firm.  The two had advanced merchandising ideas for the times.  Barrels of whiskey, rum and brandy lined the walls and a customer could sample the goods before purchasing.  In those days one dollar would be enough buy a full gallon of decent whiskey.

Hollenbach and his partner also demonstrated considerable talent in marketing their whiskey brands.    As shown on a trade card here, they adopted as a trademark a keystone -- Pennsylvania being the Keystone State--emblazoned with a red star.  Advertising a long distance phone meant that the firm solicited mail orders.  They featured only two brands but marketed them vigorously.  One whiskey was named “Hodico,” an anagram of Hollenbach’s and Dietrich’s names. The firm’s other brand was “Social Rye”.   Its label featured a colorful scene of three gents sitting around a table drinking. As shown here, that whiskey could be purchased in both quarts and flasks.

Hollenbach, Dietrich were not distillers but blenders of whiskey to meet  standards of taste for their two brands.   Their raw product almost certainly came from the many distilleries that dotted the Pennsylvania landscape at that time.  Like many liquor dealers Hollenbach, Dietrich distributed multiple giveaway items to favored customers.  Shot glasses and jigger glasses were issued for Social Rye.  The slogan on the glasses -- “Pure and Old”-- was a nod to the national campaign for pure food and beverage that had its culmination in the Pure Food and Drug Act in 1906.  A more expensive gift item was the fancy paperweight shown below,  no doubt the product of a nearby Pennsylvania glass house.  For Hodico whiskey the partners issued a tip tray featuring a “Gibson Girl-like” figure with considerable bare bosom visible.  The slogan for this whiskey was “Every Drop a Pleasure.”

The partners also sold other brands of spirits beside their own.  Among them were several that claimed to have medicinal values. “Malakof Bitters,” was such a nostrum,  a product of a Belgian firm with offices in New York.  Often marketed as a remedy, it eventually was exposed as merely a “liquor compound” by U.S. Food and Drug officials.  Hollenbach, Dietrich also marketed “Duffy’s Pure Malt Whiskey,” another alcoholic product that masqueraded as medicine.

The company proved to be a highly prosperous enterprise.   A contemporary account  noted the following:   “The firm...does a large business, handling nothing but the finest wines and whiskies, and they are the proprietors of the well known ‘Social Rye,’ handled by the trade all over the country.”   Ben’s prosperity also brought his family a large and comfortable home at 125 South Eighth Street in Reading.

Hollenbach was also recognized throughout the community for his business acumen and his participation in numerous fraternal and social organizations.   His memberships included Reading Lodge No. 115 of the Elks Club, the Sons of Veterans, Fraternal Order of Eagle Knights of Pythias and the Knights of Malta.   He also was a member of The Supreme Council of the Royal Arcanum, commonly known simply as the Royal Arcanum,  a quasi-Masonic fraternal benefit society founded in 1877 in Boston.

Ben Hollenbach died in 1915 at the young age of 44.   His funeral was held at the Lutheran Church in Reading,  to which his family were adherents.   He was buried in a local cemetery with his widow, Carrie, and daughter,  Florence,  mourning beside his gravesite.  Upon Hollenbach’s death,  Howard Detrich became president of the company, bringing his eldest son, Claude, into the business as secretary of the corporation.   As National Prohibition loomed,  Detrich in 1918 converted the business into a drug store and operated it until he died in 1940.

Prohibition and the forced closing of a liquor dealership that dated back to 1869, however, could not erase the mark that Ben Hollenbach had made during his lifetime.  This small town boy had gone from hauling a horse-drawn liquor wagon to the pinnacle of business and social circles in Reading.  He had proved to be a driver with real drive.