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September-October 2008
listed as “not over” 40 percent. Forty percent alcohol is 80 proof, similar to bourbon. Whether the “Dry Police” eventually caught up with Duffy’s Malt Whiskey is not clear but by 1926 the company that Walter built was forever out of business. Nevertheless, Duffy himself had gone from bankruptcy to riches, helped immeasurably by his ability to profit by the fumbling of his adversaries.
to declare bankruptcy, unable to pay a host of creditors. Later he would claim that he had been drawn into the affairs of Gambrill Bros., his grain dealer relatives, and being young and
Bottles and Extras
Gambrill ... Baltimore, Md.” (Fig. 24). A labeled pint from the distillery claims to be “The Purest Rye Whiskey in the United States.” (Fig. 25) Gambrill also issued embossed mini bottles (Fig. 26) and at
Figure 22 - Eutaw House, Baltimore
Figure 21 - Gambrill’s Mill Monacacy, Maryland Meet George T. Gambrill Behind many pre-Prohibition whiskey brands lie stories, but few have the soap opera quality of Maryland’s Roxbury Rye. Its saga begins with its founder, George T. Gambrill, whose reputation as a scoundrel seems to have pursued him throughout a long life. Gambrill is a familiar name in Maryland. The patriarch of the Gambrill clan was Augustine Gambrill, a plantation owner and one of the founders of Anne Arundel County in Maryland. Another ancestor was James Gambrill who bought the grain mill at Monacacy, Maryland, in 1856 (Fig. 21) only to find it 10 years later the centerpiece for a Civil War battle. A 1973 genealogical publication records three hundred years of the family in the state. Many Gambrills, George included, were involved in the grain and milling trade, principally in Baltimore. One observer has called the extended family “a milling dynasty.” Born about 1845, George’s first brush with the courts was in 1864 when, in his late teens, he was forced
naive, made the fall guy. Besides, he avowed, he had paid off his all creditors by 1868. In 1870, according to Baltimore city directories, George was back in business as a principal in Gambrill & Williar, grain dealers. Their offices were in the posh Eutaw House, a downtown hotel (Fig. 22) where Edgar Allen Poe is said to have written “The Raven.” Ten years later we find George with another grain firm, Trail & Gambrill. Since wheat, rye and corn are the basis of whiskeys, it seems a natural move for him to branch out from grain to grain alcohol as an ingredient in spirituous liquids. By the 1890 census he is recorded as a distiller. Gambrill Rides Roxbury Rye In 1893 Gambrill registered Roxbury Rye as a brand with the government, with a distillery in Roxbury, Maryland, a village in Washington County about twenty-three miles from Baltimore. Despite being located in Maryland, he incorporated the company in West Virginia, probably to avoid taxes. An energetic salesman, Gambrill built Roxbury Rye into a nationally recognized brand in relatively few years. He merchandised his liquor in attractive quart bottles. Shown here is one with original label featuring George’s initials in a logo (Fig. 23). The bottles themselves were embossed in script that read: “Roxbury Rye...Geo. T.
Figure 23 Roxbury Rye labeled quart
Figure 25 Roxbury Rye labeled pint
Figure 27 Roxbury Rye decanter
Figure 24 Roxbury Rye embossed bottle
Bottles and Extras
September-October 2008
ABSINTHE! Part II - The Paraphernalia The return of le Fee Verte - “The Green Faerie” By Cecil Munsey Copyright© 2008
Born Martha Helen Kostyra on August 3, 1941 (Fig. 1), this maven is an American business magnate, author, editor and homemaker advocate. She is also a former stockbroker and fashion model. Over the last two decades she has held a prominent position in the publishing industry; as the author of several books, hundreds of articles on the domestic arts, editor of a national housekeeping magazine, host of a popular daytime television program, and commercial spokeswoman for K-Mart. In 2001 Ladies Home Journal named her the third most powerful woman in America. In antiques shops, at antiques auctions, and at antiques shows she is recognized for her habit of collecting of old absinthe paraphernalia. She is better known, in those venues, as Martha Stewart – check Fig. 1 again and see if you now recognize her.
Figure 26 Roxbury Rye Mini bottle least one attractive back-of-the-bar decanter (Fig. 27). Before long Gambrill’s distillery was Mar yland’s sixth largest in terms of capacity. It also maintained impressive sales offices in Baltimore at 115 West Baltimore St. In 1900 Roxbury Rye was important enough to
Figure 1 Ms. Stewart came by her interest in collecting the paraphernalia used to support the culture of the “Green Faerie” most likely during her college years at Barnard. Initially she intended to major in chemistry, but switched to Art and European History, and later to Architectural History, any or all of which would have brought her in appreciative contact with historical and cultural phenomena associated with absinthiana. Her studies of European history
and art would have made her aware that in many paintings, novels and memoirs of the “Belle Époque” or “beautiful era” before the first world war, absinthe cast its green haze of creative inspiration over a generation of Parisian artists. One of the most famous paintings on the subject, Glass of Absinthe, by Degas in 1870, depicts a couple seated in a café (Fig. 2). The man drinks a red wine, while the woman consuming absinthe looks lost with a glazed empty expression in her eyes.
Figure 2 Absinthe also made an appearance in the work of Vincent Van Gogh. Three years before his death, Van Gogh painted "L'Absinthe," a canvas where "la fee verte" (green faerie) appears all-consuming. Absinthe is everywhere–the tablecloth, the reflections in the water carafe, even the street outside has the green colors of absinthe. Most scholars believe Van Gogh drank absinthe frequently, and some say he was addicted to it. However, in his letters he expresses abhorrence for both the drink and those who drank it regularly. Still, the psychosis he experienced is consistent with acute alcoholism or "absinthism."
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Writers too, found inspiration in the green world of absinthe. The poets Arthur Rimbaud and Paul Verlaine would drink absinthe together and play sadistic games with each other. Eventually Verlaine shot Rimbaud and was sentenced to prison. In the tragic aftermath of this incident Rimbaud gave up absinthe and poetry. Verlaine, who had sung the praises of absinthe in his youth, damned it on his deathbed. However, after leaving prison, poverty-stricken and alone, he continued to drink la fée verte. Alfred Jarry, eccentric author of a scandalous French absurdist play, Ubu Roi, was known to drink absinthe straight. Jarry claimed that absinthe helped him fuse together dream and reality, art and life. Ernest Hemingway never made such claims, but he did continue to drink it long after it was legally banned. And references to absinthe appear in many of his writings, including Death In The Afternoon and For Whom The Bell Tolls. Speaking of his own personal experience with absinthe: “The absinthe made everything seem better. I drank it without sugar in the dripping glass, and it was pleasantly bitter. I poured the water directly into it and stirred it instead of letting it drip. I stirred the ice around with a spoon in the brownish, cloudy mixture. I was very drunk. I was drunker than I ever remembered having been.” - Ernest Hemingway While anti-absinthe laws had slackened over the 20th century, absinthe’s stigma lingered amidst the perpetual recycling of misinformation by journalists, historians and producers alike. There was the dreadful but unconfirmed fear that absinthe rendered its drinkers both bad and mad. More than ever, the confusion begs to be conquered: Absinthe has reemerged from obscurity, into a sought-after “fad.” Paraphernalia such as bottles, spoons, drinking glasses and fountains, antique or not, fetch improbable prices. Martha Stewart show cashing
her