The Bridgeport evening farmer., 1917-06-06
M00NSH|NE WILL BE $10 A QUART
 IN N. CAROLINA
Bone Dry Law Starts Big
 Boom; Stills Abound in Mountain Wilds

Boom; Stills Abound in
 Mountain Wilds Asheville, N. C., June 6.-While the l ing forward to the roseate vision of $4 wheat and the cotton planters of l the South are seeing 25-cent cotton | just ahead, the moonshining noun | taineers of Western North Carolina are having equally roseate visions as the inauguration of the "bone dry" prohibition laws in this state on July 1 promises to raise the price of moon shine corn whiskey to $10 or more quart.
 Already notable center of the
 blockade liquor industry, the advent
 of the ''bone dry' law promises to increase the illegal manufacture of corn whiskey to a point where half the standing army of the United States would be necessary to suppress lit.
 Making corn whiskey without a government license is traditional in the mountains of Western North Carolina. The mountaineers, abso- lutely upright and honest in every particular, and scrupulously exact in meeting the smallest obligation, can not be made to understand that the making of moonshine is a violation of the law, and fines and prison sen- tences fail utterly to convince them that the law must be obeyed. There is no sense of wrong-do in their evasion of the law. Their fathers made whisky before them,S and they feel that they are perfectly Justified in convsrting their corn into the form in which it will bring the most money.
 Perhaps the biggest reason for the manufacture of the whisky is the fact that far back in the mountains, the farms are of such size and condition as to preclude the raising of more than the most scanty crops, and in or ! der to make a showing on the amount of soil available, the mountaineer i must convert his corn into more valuable product than $2 a bushel grain.
 | As a $2 bushel of corn will make a gallon of whisky worth from $8 to l $10 now in the underground market, and as that price promises to raise | to $50 gallon, the answer is illicit dfstilling
 Even with the possibilities of get l ting one quart every 1 5 days in North | lflourishing, as the product of the still
 according to demand, and as Western l North Carolina is an ideal location
 for the hiding of the illicit stills, tho business f1ourishes.
 1 N1One of the largest forces of revenue raiders in the United States works l out of Asheville. and never a week
 passes that they do not destroy from
 two to five stills, although arrests are d infrequent, owing to the nature of the territory in which the stills are located and the peculiar wireless system among the mountaineers that seems to wait ahead the news of the I coming of the raiders. And yet, with all this destruction of stills, corn liquor is always available I to the man who knows where to look
 and who has the necessary price. The men who make the whisky are
 a picturesque lot Mostly of Scotch
 Irish and English descent, they com J prise probably the purest strains ot the Caucasian race in America today Fl Although illiterate, as a rule, these moonshiners are kindly and gentle, with an inborn gentIeness inherent to the race, although they can be reused to,a deadly fury when wronged or led
 
 Their names are synonymous with hospitality, but woe betide the luck less raider, who takes advantage of that hospitality to pursue theA host or a neighbor for infraction of the revenue laws. The records show sew eral revenue raiders who started out to seek blockade stills, and who are simply reported missing. Their fate will never be known.
 When 1t is remembered that Mt Mitchell. the highest point east o1 the Rocky Mountains, is located ir Western North Carolina, and that g X hundred more peaks over 5000 feet in height are found in the Appala- chian system in Western North Caro- lima, to say nothing of innumerabls | peaks over 4,000 feet in height, the range of mountain fastnesses can be partially estimated, and each noun tain offers some secluded spot where the manufacture of whisky can be
 carried on in comparative safety. H Add, the presence of impenetrable
 laurel thickets, in which a man car pass within a dozen feet of a half
 dozen men without being aware o1 l their presence, and the tremendous
 advantages of the section for moon sinners can be better appreciated. Hundreds of streams of pure noun
 tain water are to be found through
 out the range. and the still, often 2 i crude, homemade affair. and often z 1 high-priced manufactured article o,
 the copper variety, in addition to tho
 corn, is all that is needed for ths moonshiner to set up a business. While not treacherous by nature
 the mountaineer who takes chances
 with the government does not lool
 on the waylaying of a "revenuer" al
 either a sin or a crime. All of whict
 explains why Deputy Collector J. A Galloway, recently had one eye re
 moved, he having been shot from am
 bush last fall after making a success l full raid.
 \ At times the spirit shown is more \ vindictive, especially toward an in
 former, who is held several degree' I lower in the social scale than "rev
 enuer.''
 \ ''Moonshine' is legal tender in thu
 mountains. That it passes for cur
 rency for food and clothing is per
 haps best demonstrated by the fac
 that from one township alone in Bun U / ir,A