The Hill: 1890 - Now
Exerpts from the writings of Louis H. Schmidt

(continued)

In the decade after 1920, Cheltenham experienced an economic renaissance. Eighteen companies selected sites and located plants in the industrial valley, including the National Bearing Metals Corporation, Liggitt and Meyers tobacco, the Forest Park Highlands Amusement Corp. and several low grade foundries and shoe companies. On the eve of the depression, 144 Italians worked at the nearby shoe factories, while hundreds of others were dispersed throughout the local economy.

A story I almost passed up was the story of prohibition (June 1919). This is an important ingredient in the story of The Hill. There seemed to be complete cooperation from the church, police and between both factions of Italians (Sicilians & Lombards), the business community (stores, taverns,and the manufacturers). The church turned a blind eye. There is even an old legend about the burning to the ground of the saint Ambrose church. It is said a vat of moonshine exploded in the rectory. There was a code of silence; no one told what they knew.

The police must have known, and there was, most of the time someone to warn of a raid. When warned, the people of the neighborhood would move the equipment. Isidore Oldani Jr's father was owner of the Blue Ridge Soda Co. and President of the St.Ambrose Building Committee. They would come from work and find their basement and garage filled with supplies, sugar, and cans of moonshine.

There were times when a raid would be completed. An old barber remembered a time in 1919 when agents busted a still and the residue slop flowed into the gutter. Chickens would eat the mash and weave away drunk. One day on the 5200 block of Wilson, the Federal men went from door to door. If the occupant talked in Lombard, they wouldn't go in. If they talked Sicilian, the house would be raided. That day the gutters were full of moonshine.

In December 1921, agents found a massive still at 5225 Bischoff, seizing 5,000 gal. of alcohol and the still itself which produced 125 gallons per day. One of the biggest busts in St. Louis history occurred in 1925, when agents surprised a small group of Sicilians on The Hill. They confiscated 40,000 gallons of white lightning plus a unit capable of delivering 250 gallons a day.

A social worker said he knew of several hundred families, both Lombard and Sicilian who participated in the various stages of bootlegging. The men were employed part of the time each week at the brickyards, and at night they engaged in a branch bootlegging activity. Some hauled sugar; others dug cellars for stills or hauled equipment from place to place. He estimated that about 90% of the men were engaged in some phase of it during prosperous times (1919 to 1933).

Prohibition functioned as an important agent of the 1920's neighborhood economy. Grocers supplied the sugar, cornmeal, and yeast; businessmen bankrolled operations and loaned warehouse space; saloonkeepers, soft drink vendors and grocery stores provided a ready outlet for the finished product.

Luckily The Hill escaped the organized crime route. There were killings, but most was due to outsider mob battles. Few Italians on The Hill tried to compete with the mobs. They perceived prohibition not as an escape from their ghetto, but rather the means to uplift the neighborhood.

Moonshine meant the difference between poverty and middle class. There were dramatic changes on The Hill from 1919 to 1933. Small brick bungalows were built, later larger houses on the edge of the community. Cars were bought; also fine clothes and expensive furniture.

Fully 29% of the homes built on the hill from 1900 to 1950 were built in the 1920's. Also some of the profits could have been directed to the quarter-of-a-million dollar St. Ambrose Church, which, by 1935, was only $12,000 in debt. Prohibition allowed the colony to acquire the trappings of the middle class, but it did not alter the value structure. Few bootleggers paid the price for bigness and efficiency. No mafia tyrannized the inhabitants. Prohibition infused money into the neighborhood economy, and did not take people out of the community.

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