Editor’s note: The following Post Times column by former staff writer Eliot Kleinberg originally ran in May 2020. We are reprinting it here to coincide with the publication of “Hypocrite’s Row,” the first of four books in his series about the adventures of Prohibition-era Miami police detective Nate Moran. “Hypocrite’s Row” is currently available on Amazon.
Someone in the newsroom has asked what was the impact of Prohibition in Palm Beach County and the Treasure Coast. The answer: not much. Here’s more from a 2002 column and a 2005 feature:
Prohibition, that noble experiment, might have been the law of the land from 1920 to 1933, but it was shamelessly ignored in the boom towns of South Florida. Here was a thirsty tourist trade, local officials vulnerable to corruption, miles of open beaches and coves, a vast Everglades to hide stills and a smuggling pipeline from nearby islands.
All Prohibition did was turn South Florida’s lucrative alcohol business over to criminals.
Mobsters oversaw stills, smuggling and distribution to hotels and speak-easies and ran many establishments themselves. Rum-running became routine. A case of liquor was $18 in the Bahamas, double that on the street, or behind closed doors, in South Florida. It was as much as $100 up North.
Boats would shuttle the liquor from Nassau to West End and Bimini, less than 60 miles from Florida. Contraband then was packed in “hams,” six bottles to a burlap sack, padded with paper and straw. Boats sped the hooch to the mainland.
Private dining rooms were built at The Breakers so tourists could drink discreetly. At the Royal Poinciana Hotel, imbibers sneaked to the bar by walking down “Hypocrite’s Row.”
In 1927, the U.S. Treasury Department created the Bureau of Prohibition Agents. Not surprisingly, many were assigned to South Florida.
On the evening of Jan. 19, 1930, Prohibition agents Robert Moncure and Franklin R. Patterson and two other agents went to the home of alleged rum-runner George W. Moore at 2403 S. Poinsettia Ave. — now South Dixie Highway — north of Belvedere Road in West Palm Beach. The agents had obtained a search warrant after a man said he bought 13 quarts of whiskey at the home. Shotgun blasts cut down Moncure and Patterson.
Moore later argued the warrant had been for daytime only and he was defending his home from unknown trespassers. After 24 minutes, a jury ruled Moore not guilty in Moncure’s death. The Patterson charge was later dropped.
Six months later, Moore was charged with assaulting a federal officer in connection with Patterson’s death. He was convicted in federal court in 1934 and sentenced to 10 years. He died in May 1958.
This article originally appeared on Palm Beach Post: Rum, crime, and murder in South Florida’s wild Prohibition era
Reporting by Eliot Kleinberg, Special to the Palm Beach Post / Palm Beach Post
USA TODAY Network via Reuters Connect
