Unearth the Capsule: Bottoms Up, Bootleggers Down
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The Roaring Twenties were in full swing- Flappers, jazz, the glitz and glam that came with the economic growth for America at the time; the entire decade appeared to be one continuous celebration. While it might have been a party, one popular ingredient was absent:
The booze.
At least, the law-abiding parties lacked the drinks.
Alongside the grand cultural, social and political changes of the Jazz Age, Prohibition had also come into effect. Prohibition was the ban against drinking alcohol with the aim to reduce crime and improve the health of Americans, however, there is lesser known information. The Twenties not only saw the rise of organised crime, but the deathly decline of drinkers due to the government’s involvement of increasing the harmful chemicals found within industrial alcohol.
After an internet hoax had spread false information about the government setting out to purposefully kill illegal drinkers by poisoning their stash, I was curious to see how this rumour started out.
Surprisingly, the fact isn’t too far from the fiction.
The U.S. Government’s hopes started to fall when they realised people continued to get access to their much-wanted, yet banned drinks. Most of the crowds obtained illegally transported alcohol operated by the Mob, or by attempting to brew their own. Additionally, they could also access alcohol from non-traditional sources.
Prohibition saw the ban of manufacturing, selling, and transportation of drinking alcohol. However, alcohol wasn’t simply used just for sipping on at parties with Gatsby. Industrial alcohol was often found in other products, like perfumes. After discovering that by distilling industrial alcohol people and bootleggers were making it drinkable and sellable, the American government came out with a plan in 1926 to increase the toxicity of industrial alcohol they knew people were drinking by adding a cocktail of chemicals, including methanol. They thought that the consumption of alcohol would decrease because people would decide against drinking it since the taste was revolting and the toxins unremovable.
People did not.
To add some context, 2-8 ounces of methanol can be lethal to its drinkers. Unlike the industrial alcohol bootleggers and consumers had been previously distilling, the added toxins were much harder to be removed from the industrial alcohols. The outcome? Consequently, due to all of the deaths, vision loss, and other health declines that came with those ingesting the tampered products, the outcome was the complete opposite of the governments Prohibition plan of having a “healthier” America. Christmas of 1926 reportedly saw 23 deaths and others having vision loss due to the methanol intake.
One fact that is up for an ol’ fashioned bar debate is agreeing on the total number of deaths. While some estimate the number of fatalities was around 10,000 (this number coming from the internet hoax), others have stated that that statistic is lower.
Regardless of the number, many were negatively affected and continued to be by their bottles until the end of Prohibition in 1933.
As the sun sets on Prohibition, the (tequila) sun rises on answered questions. No, the government did not organize the deaths of citizens by knowingly poisoning their alcohol. That being said, yes, the government was in charge of adding increased chemicals to the legal, industrial alcohols in order to discourage the illegal intake and distilling. Marking almost 100 years since Prohibition, I’ll raise my glass high and cheers to hopefully never having to see something like that again in this day and age.
Bibliography:
Marie-Chantal Chamberland
Marie-Chantal/Marie/M-C is a reader, writer, Marvel fan, and is currently studying Professional Writing. Some of her interests include traveling, skating. learning about the past, baking, and hanging out with her dog.
