Foreword: Is drinking from the hind end of a pig a particularly enjoyable way of swallowing whiskey? A good number of pre-Prohibition distillers and liquor dealers must have thought so. More than a few provided swigs from swine-figured bottles of glass and ceramic. Featured here are three whiskey outfits that were particularly notable for their porkers.
The Amann Brothers of Cincinnati employed their pig flasks they for their “Berkshire Bitters,” the name of a famous breed of swine. The Amann family originated in Europe, the exact place variously given as France or Germany. Daniel was the firstborn in 1822, followed 13 years later by the birth of Anthony. In 1839 their father uprooted the family to the United States, settling in Cincinnati. There a third brother, Edmund, was born.
Educated in local schools, the brothers appear early to have gone to work in the burgeoning local distilling and whiskey merchandising industry. Advertising themselves as wholesale liquor dealers, the Amanns conducted a major rectifying — whiskey blending — operation. One of their prime sellers was the highly alcoholic “Berkshire Bitters.”
According to a relative, the recipe for that elixir came from the wife of a close friend of Edmund Amann. “Grandmother Harriet Conway McRoberts had a recipe for bitters that William [McRoberts] gave to the Amann brothers as he was on the decline. They put that bitters recipe in little pig bottles.” Today these porkers avidly are sought by collectors who care little about the swigs of bitters they once contained or granny’s recipe.
Like many rectifiers, Amann Bros. needed a consistently available supply of “raw” whiskey for their products in order to thrive. This was a continuing problem, one exacerbated by the advent of various whiskey “trusts” that hiked prices on spirits available to rectifiers. The brothers began to look for a distillery they could buy.
In 1890 they found one. Initially known as the Almond Distillery it was located about 100 miles directly south of Cincinnati in Jessamine County, Kentucky. They paid $10,000 for the property, a relative bargain likely related to the plant being located on low ground and subject to periodic flooding. The photo indicates the extent of the facility.
Before the Amann’s bought the distillery it had the mashing capacity 200 bushels a day and capacity to store about 7,700 barrels for aging. The brothers promptly increased the mashing capacity to 300 bushel per day and over time increased warehouse capacity to 13,500 barrels. Most of this production was shipped to the Amanns for rectifying and bottling; the rest was sold to other wholesalers and rectifiers. From all indications, the Amanns, now assured of a steady supply of product, were thriving during the 1880s. By the beginning of the 20th Century, however, two of the brothers had died and in 1903, Edmund sold the distillery and shut down the company. The pigs remain as a reminder of the Amanns.
Festooned with patriotic red, white, and blue bunting from top to bottom, the Star Saloon appeared in a photograph bedecked for the 1911 inauguration in Frankfort of the incoming Governor of Kentucky, James McCray. Located at 222 St. Clair Street between Main and Broadway, the Star had long since become a favorite “watering hole” for the political and business elites of the state capital. Its amiable proprietor, Joseph Schroff, was a familiar local personality.
The success of a saloon was largely dependent on the personality of the owner. A genial proprietor with a memory for faces and names, quick with a welcoming word, a keen sense of hospitality, perhaps something of a colorful personality, and above all, a generous spirit, could be assured of attracting a clientele. On the last point, Schroff excelled.
His tradition of gifting customers across the bar with small ceramic bottles of whiskey was not unusual for the era. Many publicans were accustomed to handing out mini-jugs and bottles that advertised their drinking establishments, each with several swallows of liquor inside. Schroff went a step further by giving away bottles of unusual interest, containers shaped like pigs.
Schroff’s hogs were distinctive for their personality. Note the pig bottle above, one that carries Schroff’s name, Star Saloon, and his address. Upon further examination the porker exhibits its individuality by its flattened ears, distinctive nose and circular eyes. Its backside, with curled tail and large drinking hole add to its distinctiveness.
That pig looks quite different from another Schroff giveaway pig, one with the leaner look of an Ozarks hog. This ceramic bottle has well-defined ears, a long snout and wide nostrils, and most distinctive of all two splashes of cobalt for eyes. Rather than just a hole from which to quaff the contents, its tail forms a clear neck for drinking purposes.
Regrettably, Schroff’s time was limited at the Star Saloon. He died in August 1896 in Frankfort, only 43 years old. He left a widow with seven children to raise, the oldest sixteen, the youngest, one.
For more than a half-century one family operated a wholesale and retail liquor business in Cincinnati, Ohio, evidently prospering by close collaboration. A 1905 book that provided caricatures of the city’s businessmen celebrated the Bielers’ success by depicting one of the second generation, likely Charles J., and two hands, those of his brothers, as they guided the George Bieler Sons Company. The family motto was “Pull Together.”
Blenders of whiskey not distillers, the Bieler boys heavily merchandised their flagship whiskey, Brookfield Rye, using the slogans, “Rare Old Perfect,” and “Made famous by public favor.” Although they packaged their whiskey in glass bottles, they favored ceramic jugs to make their product stand out amid the intense competition being provided by a plethora of Cincinnati liquor dealerships.
Like their Cincinnati competitors, the Bielers provided an array of giveaway items to saloons and other favored customers. My favorite Bieler giveaways are their pig bottles. Among them is honey brown ceramic pig that has a butt plug that identifies it as from George Bieler Sons and containing Ronny Club whiskey. In 2013 this item fetched $778 at auction. Another Bieler hog bears a splotchy brown coat and the brand name on a rear haunch.
The Bieler Boys continued to pull together and prosper through the 1900s. In 1901 they moved their operation to larger quarters at 717 Main Street only to move again to the northeast corner of Seventh and Main Streets in 1903. There was a shift to the northwest corner of that same intersection several years later. The next address in Cincinnati city directories was to 126 East Seventh St. in 1911. Despite the firm’s success, Prohibition was fast closing in. When Ohio went dry in 1916, the end of Geo. Bieler’s Sons Co. was in sight. They moved to smaller quarters that same year, probably to maintain their mail order business, but terminated altogether in 1918.
The pig figural bottles displayed here today is over 100 years old and considered antique. They — and those like them — are avidly sought. A least one collector has created what he calls his “pig pen” to display his fabulous group of ceramic and glass porkers. Originating as giveaway items by the Amanns, Bielers and Schroff, each of the bottles shown here now fetches from hundreds of dollars to over $1,000.
Note: Each of the whiskey men cited here has been the subject of a previous post on this blog: The Amanns, May 6, 2017; Joseph Schroff, August 29, 2020, and The Bielers, May 27, 2013.
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