Kansas City daily journal., 1897-02-09
WHISKY, ILLICIT OR STRAIGHT
THE OZARK MOoNsHINERs BEING
THINNED OUT AT A GREAT RATE.
Deputy Cox Reports the Practical
Breaking Up of the Business
Revenue Office Handling More
Whisky Than Ever Before.

| According to report made to Internal
| Revenue Collector Withers yesterday by
| Thomas Cox, deputy collector of revenue
| at Springfield, the "moonshiners" of the
| Ozark mountains and the secluded south
| ern portion of the state have been pretty
! well disposed of, and the business has been
| practically stopped This is the first time
| in many years that there has not been
''moonshining' going on in that district
| and it has been the hardest sort of work
to keep illicit distilling from making great
headway.
In his letter Deputy Cox relates some
| facts that have been of material aid in
bringing about the suppression of the
Illicit traffic. He says that during the past
two years there has been a great influx
of homeseekers in that portion of the
state, so that places heretofore desolate
and unoccupied are now well settled. These
families are from the Western and North
ern states, and are all w-abiding citizens,
who give no quarter to crooks This has
wrought great change. Heretofore there
were few settlers there, and of them 80
per cent were heartily in sympathy with
the 'moonshiners" and believed that a fed
eral officer was legitimate target for any
sporty men who wanted to do a little
shooting. The settlers would furnish the
corn to the stills, they would help to pro-
tect the men from arrest and would share
in the proceeds after the whisky had been
sold to peddlers from the territory and
OtAeE pldCeS. III tnlS way IL was almost I'M
possible to get accurate information as to
where the stills were located.
About year ago dozen stills were
moved there from Tennessee and Missis-
sippi, and the business was taken up at
great rate. Mr.. Cox and Deputy Marshal
Brown started after the -'.moonshiners"
and have made a score of arrests. They
had to do some shooting in several of the
raids. They found the people disposed to
cooperate with them and the workers,
finding they had lost public sympathy,
ha nnrf iC
one in which Mr.. Withers takes great
pride. Deputy Collector Cox, of Springfield,
is brother of Wiley o. Cox, of this city.
We are doing to-day the largest business
ever done in this revenue district; there are
more distilleries running, more liquor be-
ing manufactured and more being put in
and taken out of bond than at any time in
the history of the district" said Chief
enue department, yesterday TO a reporter
for the Journal.
We now have sixty distilleries in op-
Grafton in the district. and we are storing
the product of thirty-four outside distii-
leries in the bonded warehouse here This
gives US the product of ninety-four distil-
lerieS to be put out through our office. and
VIII aGd nicely to the cash receipts of the
office during the year. This is double the
number shown on the records of three
Years ago, and yet we are handling the Of
nee with the same force that was employed
at that time We have stored in the ware
houses under our control, that are located
over $4,000 gallons of liquor, and there are |
located in the bonded warehouse here
many hundreds of barrels of liquor and |
the number is being constantly added TO. |
Kansas City has been forging to the front |
rapidly in the last two years as distrib- |
uting point fer Eastern distilleries. The |
law that permits the shipment of whisky |
here in bond has been responsible for that |
fact, and enables this Office to receive the |
tax paid on thousands of gallons manu- |
factured in other states and sent here to |
be distributed through the agencies