Oral History Interview with Lucille Geoghegan

[Begin Interview] Interviewer: This is an interview with Lucille Geoghegan by Mary (Height?) from the Kentucky Oral History Commission, Prohibition in Nelson County: Its Causes and Effects. The interview was conducted in Bardstown, Nelson County, Kentucky, at 114 North Fifth Street on January 22, 1988. Miss Geoghegan, would you give us a little information about yourself? Where you were born and your parents and what you've done through your life?

Geoghegan: I was born in Nelson County about two miles west of Bardstown in a house on Highway 62, on a farm. My father was John H. Geoghegan. His ancestry goes back to Amherst Denton Geoghegan, who was one of the pioneers 1:00in Elizabethtown. And Sam Goodin, who settled Goodin's Fork, and his son-in-law, (Atkinson Hill?) and (Hurley Judge?) in Nelson County. My mother was Mattie (Cratie?), called Mattie. Her real name was Martha Malvine. Her ancestry goes back on one side to Warren Cash, an old Baptist preacher who had much to do with these early churches. And David (Cratie?), Richard (Edlin?), who are near Goodin's Fort. Most of my ancestry has been in Nelson County, Kentucky since the pioneers moved in. I became a teacher. Taught in Jefferson County more than fifty years. I'm now a retired teacher. I was in elementary education.

Interviewer: 2:00You're still, you're presently living in Nelson County.

Geoghegan: Yes. My parents bought a farm close to (?), Highway 605 just off Highway 62, opposite the Nelson County High School. After their death, my sister and I purchased this farm, small farm, from our two brothers. We live there. She is also a retired teacher. She taught in the Nelson County High School.

Interviewer: Miss Lucy, on my right, was that what they call Early Times, Kentucky, original?

Geoghegan: Yes. This property is adjoining the distillery property that was Early Times distillery before Prohibition. And farther out the road, there was the distillery that became Double Springs. That distillery became JTS Brown, after Prohibition. Further out the Woodlawn Road 3:00became, was the Early Times distillery, was the Greenbriar distillery. And it became Double Springs. It is now the sight of the American Greeting Card factory.

Interviewer: Miss Lucille, what about Prohibition here when you were living in Nelson County? When did you first hear about Prohibition?

Geoghegan: Just about the time I was in the first grade, they began talking about Prohibition. World War One was looming, and people began saying this was a way to win the war. That grain was needed to feed starving Europe. Therefore, it should not be used for the making of whiskey. And of course, there had been agitation before that. Carrie Nation had done her axe wielding. 4:00And other people were arguing. The temperance league was probably active in Louisville, but I heard (?) there. But it seems to me that by the time they (bolstered?) that and the amendment was passed, the war was over. But it was supposed to be for human (development?) Interviewer: That little pause, Miss Lucille was our heating system noise in the background. It kind of reminded us both of Carrie Nation. You mentioned that your father had been a storekeeper/gager.

Geoghegan: A storekeeper/gager was hired and paid by the US government to supervise the operation of a distillery. To see that the whiskey, he tested the whiskey when it was finished to know that it was of proper strength, of proper proof. 5:00And he stenciled the end of the barrel, saying when it was put in. Now when I first became conscious of Prohibition, when it was necessary that the distilleries be guarded twenty-four hours a day, he then went to having a service time, seven to three, or three to eleven, or eleven to seven. Three men had to guard the distillery, to carry the gun, to keep people from stealing whiskey out of the warehouses. That was dangerous. Sometimes men were killed. That probably was about 1921. And I think it must have been about 1923 when the whiskey was removed from the warehouses in Nelson County. But during that time, all the people that I know of 6:00were storekeeper/gagers who took turns at being assigned either from seven in the morning to three in the afternoon, three to eleven, or eleven to seven. So the distilleries were guarded to keep people from stealing it. Either the locks would be cut or, many, I think, many of the warehouses just had sheet iron walls. And it was easy to rip that metal off far enough to get into the distillery. And I guess, of course I was conscious of it until when it was repealed after Roosevelt became president in 1933.

Interviewer: The storekeeper/gagers were the only people that were allowed to be around the distillery? There were not any employees from the--

Geoghegan: There had to be employees 7:00to go into the warehouses on the seven to three shift, to check for leaks and things of that kind. To see that the barrels stayed in good shape. And repair barrels. Now that's all I know of being there.

Interviewer: So were you ever around with his father when he was doing his duty?

Geoghegan: I have been in the office of the Walker distillery. But that's the only distillery I remember being, I was never in the distillery itself. I was in the office, the company office, one room, and the government office in the adjoining room. And the Walker distillery was out Highway 62, toward Boston, at the top of Withrow Hill. The city dump was on the other. You'd go down in the valley and on the other side was the city dump. One warehouse was down by Withrow Creek. The other was just about, one of the others, 8:00I think there were two or three there, were just about the place where the old state garage is. Between the state garage, and then I believe there has been a whiskey dispensing wholesale place just to the west of the state garage. The state garage has now been made into county offices.

Interviewer: Well did the owners of the distilleries, did they resent the government men? Or were they glad to see them there so they could protect the whiskey?

Geoghegan: Well, of course, I suppose some of the owners resented the supervision, that they couldn't shortchange on filling bottles. They had bottles had to be filled in the bottling house. The bottling line filled as much whiskey as should go into a quart bottle went into it. And then the storekeeper/gager 9:00was responsible for a stamp being put across the top, over the stopper, cork stopper, in the bottle. And there it stayed until the whiskey was opened by the person who bought the bottle. That was, I don't know what the tax on it was before Prohibition. And the last I knew of it, since Prohibition it's something over ten dollars a gallon that the government gets. And that's shown by this stamp that goes across the bottle to this bottling bond.

Interviewer: Now you're speaking of the medicinal whiskey now, during Prohibition?

Geoghegan: I suppose it was taxed that way. I never did see a bottle of medicinal whiskey. It was only dispensed by the doctors writing a prescription for a half pint 10:00of whiskey or a pint of whiskey. And it was bought at the drugstore. Now I don't know whether Bardstown drugstores handled it or not. I know that Newman drugstore in Louisville sold whiskey during Prohibition. Because I saw a woman receive a prescription from her father's cousin for her father to have a bottle of medicinal whiskey. But then she had to pay for the whiskey. He didn't charge her for the prescription.

Interviewer: So you really don't know who got that in the end, did you?

Geoghegan: I did not see anything. I did not see it. It was wrapped when she got it.

Interviewer: How did the people in the area feel about Prohibition? The leaders of the community in the area and the town?

Geoghegan: I really don't know. Because I was just a child at that time. I didn't get too much of a feeling about it. 11:00But I do know that I can't remember any other industry that hired people the way the distilleries did. Most of the work had to be done by hand. The bottling line hired a number of women. Now none of the distilleries were big, like Heaven Hill or Barton. They were all small distilleries. But there must have been ten or fifteen distilleries in Nelson County at that time. So the distilleries were the biggest employer. Other people worked in the drugstore, one or two. And several in (?), and two or three in different dry goods stores, like Spalding's, and Nelson Dry Goods and Louis Brothers and the Wilson Brothers. And in the grocery store, because I know the grocery stores (were?) serve yourself. So I'm sure it was 12:00devastating to the county to lose that source of income and that source of taxes. Because the distilleries, of course, had to pay taxes, local taxes, to the county, to the state, and then they paid the federal tax on the whiskey that went out. Of course, they recovered the taxes by adding it on to the cost of the whiskey. But it was a source of income for this county and the county certainly was bleak, I would say, until Prohibition was repealed.

Interviewer: Right.

Geoghegan: In fact, one gentleman, some tourist in Bardstown on the main street, said, "What is that odor in the air?" And one man said, "That's democratic prosperity." After the Prohibition was repealed. I think they were running off the whiskey in (Barton?). Now one thing that was 13:00another source of income was that people might raise just a few cattle on their place, and then pin hookers, or men who went around, bought up those steers and put them into the cattle yards that were going in the distilleries. I don't remember anybody buying slop from a distillery before Prohibition. They wouldn't have had any, most of them wouldn't have had any way to haul it except to haul it with a horse and wagon. Not many farmers owned a truck.

Interviewer: That's right.

Geoghegan: In fact, I can't remember any farmer that owned a truck. But they raised slopped out cattle. And then I don't know how the cattle were shipped to Louisville, were moved to the stockyards, because there were stockyards here at this depot to load cattle. They were loaded on the train and sent to Louisville. They may have been driven, or that would be probably the only way they could have been moved. 14:00But we lived on past Walker distillery. The stockyard was down close to the creek, Withrow Creek, and up a hill and a little bit over the hill to the property adjoining the airport. On the east side of the airport was my father's farm. He farmed along with being a storekeeper/gager. Had a large number of chickens and sold eggs. And when they took the cattle away from those cattle yards in the summer, (?) whiskey to be made, and they took the, they closed down the distillery, making whiskey. And sold the cattle. The flies nearly drove the cattle and horses, and the people, too, crazy! For a week or so. Because they spread to the neighboring farms. And 15:00there wasn't any spray to put on the cattle and horses from the flies. And the only protection people had were screens. It seems such a short time ago for all these things to have happened and now the progress was (?) Interviewer: It is amazing, the things that have occurred. You mentioned the term pin hooker, Miss Geoghegan. Could you define that again for us?

Geoghegan: A pin hooker was a person, usually a man, I never heard of a woman doing it, who went around the country and would buy up cattle, maybe hogs, and ship them to Louisville to make a profit on them. Of course it was hard for a man who had just two or three animals to get it, get those shipped to a stockyard. And he would ship a number, and he depended on making a profit. 16:00That was the way he made a living. Mister Ed Abel was one that, in a way, he really used it in a derogatory manner. And yet he did do a service to the community. And George M. Abel was another one. I don't think that their descendents would object to their names being used, because they were the two that I remember from way back. I know other men later. But I can't put a first name to them because I'm not sure which, I know first and last names, but I'm not sure about first names.

Interviewer: Were any of the distilleries in the area allowed to operate? Or did they just use the aged whiskey that they already had on hand?

Geoghegan: You mean during Prohibition?

Interviewer: Right.

Geoghegan: There was not a distillery in Nelson County that operated 17:00from the time the law went into effect. And most of the people, many of the distilleries and the brand names were sold. For instance, you referred to Early Times. Early Times was produced in Kentucky, but it was not produced in Nelson County after Prohibition. I don't know anything about the Old Walker brand. I don't know, there was Tom Moore, and there was Mattingly and Moore. And I know that the people who had the distillery over at Fairfield said that brand, McKenna, I believe it was, wouldn't be produced anywhere else unless it was produced in Nelson County. I know they said that. Now whether that carried through or not, I don't know. But somebody had a distillery after Prohibition on Highway 62 just east of Bardstown 18:00called Fairfield distillery. And I don't think it had anything to do with the old McKenna distillery that was at Fairfield. Some of these are just opinions, because I did not do any research on this.

Interviewer: I heard my father speak of that. I'll check into that some more. The connection. Have you heard the term (bottles?) for Uncle Sam?

Geoghegan: No. I've never heard that. What does it mean to you?

Interviewer: I heard that they were allowed to bottle so much for the government, and so much for medicinal purposes.

Geoghegan: When? During Prohibition?

Interviewer: During Prohibition.

Geoghegan: Possibly the term was confused of a term, of the time shortly after Prohibition. I was under the impression that all the whiskey in Nelson County was moved out still 19:00in barrels. I don't know. Now that's what happened when I was a teenager. And unless I saw it, I really wouldn't know. But I got the impression that it all was moved away from Nelson County before it was bottled. Mildred (Brunson?) might know more about that than I would, because she's older than I am. Of course, she was (?) daughter, and he was involved in whiskey after Prohibition. During Prohibition, my father farmed. And then after Prohibition, he applied and was reinstated as a storekeeper/gager. And worked most of the time here in Nelson County until he retired sometime in the early 1940s.

Interviewer: Well, he worked a long time, just as you did.

Geoghegan: Well, he had two terms at it. With a break in the middle. 20:00Interviewer: Break in the middle, right.

Geoghegan: And going back to your asking me how the people in Nelson County felt about Prohibition, I can't think they felt very good about it. Now of course there were moral people who thought the drinking of people, and therefore the making of whiskey, was morally wrong. And then some of them who felt people were going to drink, and they better have legal whiskey to drink than some that was made illegally, and under conditions that might be poisonous.

Interviewer: Did the feelings against whiskey, the drinking of whiskey, (consumption?) of whiskey, have (more or less segments?) of religious affiliation? Did different religions--

Geoghegan: Yes, I would say so. But some of the people who were in churches who 21:00expressed feelings against whiskey were involved in it. And they had been involved in it before. Now my family's not, we're not drinking people. We don't, we usually had some around the house. Mother would mix honey or sugar and lemon juice in whiskey as a homemade remedy for a cough or a sore throat. And the whiskey, 100 proof whiskey, is not as strong as the rubbing alcohol you put on a cut, but it has that same medicinal effect. One thing that everybody that I knew about had, what I thought my father and other people said was (first shot?) After the repeal of Prohibition, when my father was back at, I said, "You never said a word about (first shots?). What became of that? 22:00What was it?" Well, it was the first whiskey that came off when they were distilling the whiskey. It was very high proof. It's probably higher proof than rubbing alcohol. And that was given away. We usually had a bottle around the house. Mother put as much camphor in it, more camphor (?) than would dissolve. And you used it the way we now use rubbing alcohol. And it's stronger than rubbing alcohol, with the combination of camphor and that first shot. The best I can learn, nobody ever drank it. It was just too strong.

Interviewer: Too strong.

Geoghegan: And of course it was not put in a charred oak barrel, so it was clear as water. As a child I didn't know why whiskey was brown when that was 23:00clear as water. But it was used for medicinal purposes. And of course there was a person who might need a hot toddy. But we were not drinking people. Yet my father worked for the government part of the distillery. And that, there were several men around town who did that. Around Nelson County. But I can't, going back and thinking over this, I can't remember any trials in Nelson County prosecuting anyone for moonshining or bootlegging. Everyone that I know of, that I can remember, was prosecuted in the federal court in Louisville. And Judge Dawson, one of the judges, is credited with remarking that practically every farm in certain areas had had moonshine on it. Well, I don't know. I know that there were farms that didn't have moonshine. Ours was 24:00one. My father was not going to have anything to do with it. But on the other hand, if he knew what the other person's doing, he kept his mouth shut about it. It was healthy. So I feel that the authorities felt there better be, prosecution better take place under federal law, rather than under any state laws. That speaks for the feelings of the people in Nelson County. And maybe I'm judging that because after I was out of high school, I went to college two years. And then I taught in Jefferson County the whole time. So I was not around Bardstown to hear as much discussion as probably somebody that lived here. Someone else had a different story, well, that person had a different point of view. 25:00Interviewer: Did you have a general feeling that people were elated when Prohibition was over? I mean, finally they would begin to think of better times ahead?

Geoghegan: Definitely. Remember, when Roosevelt ran against Hoover, banks were failing, factories were closing in Louisville. Things were in a bad shape when that election occurred. In fact, my father drove to Louisville and met me at school for me to come to Bardstown and vote. That was the first election. It (was?) the first election that I'd been old enough to vote in. It was the first election that I voted in. And people were looking forward to 26:00the change, because one thing Roosevelt was for was the legalization of the making of whiskey and beer and so forth. As a sideline, I went to teach at (Prepton?). I was in a German section of Jefferson County. People were of German extraction, (?) I found one home after another in which I was entertained, I was offered either home brew or wine. They made it their own, and they were proud of it. Within three or four years after the repeal of Prohibition, when it was legal, immediately those people started buying their beer instead of making their own. They were buying their wine. And I was never offered a drink. (So?) they didn't have to be proud of it.

Interviewer: I wonder what your father's reaction was to that. 27:00His daughter, little country daughter going to the city and drinking.

Geoghegan: Well, it was the only place I could get a job at the time. The population of Nelson County was going down at the time I needed a job. There was no place for me to teach in Nelson County. I tried to get a job. Well, I did get one, but there was no place in the neighborhood for me to board. And the roads were bad enough, I certainly couldn't have driven. And I wouldn't have made enough to buy a car anyway. So I got a job in Jefferson County. All those schools, the population of Jefferson County and Louisville was increasing. People were moving there to get work. And this was in three years, two years, different factories there were closing down because times were getting worse.

Interviewer: That's right.

Geoghegan: And banks were failing 28:00during that time. The Boston Bank closed in Nelson County. And People's Bank closed here in Bardstown.

Interviewer: You mentioned, of course, the Depression. Was Nelson County more or less in a depression because of all these distilleries that had closed before 1929, even? Were they in their own depression already?

Geoghegan: Well, the whole country was going into depression before, it was widespread. It wasn't just Nelson County.

Interviewer: Right. Well I meant because of the aspect of your distilleries, you know, employing a lot of people-- did it affect this area?

Geoghegan: I don't see what it could, but what it had to affect the county. More than many other counties. Because many other counties were not depending on distilleries. I think Nelson County had more distilleries than any other county in the state.

Interviewer: As far as I know, 29:00that's what it sounds--

Geoghegan: So it would be, it would have more effect. Now as a child, you don't know things the way adults would know. But I can't think of, many people left that had been, adults (?) to realize. Now people could lose their farm for having an illegal distillery or moonshine on it. I don't know. I can't remember anyone who did.

Interviewer: So the officials, law enforcement, kind of overlooked those things?

Geoghegan: Must have been. I think some people lost their cars, maybe, that they were using to haul. But I can't name anybody who did. And I can't name anybody who lost their farm. I know some people had loans had bought a farm and had 30:00federal land bank loans on them that they lost their farms by the time the Depression was over. So maybe they just turned their heads to a lot of this, right? They could have. When you're a kid, you don't know all of these things that are going on one way or the other. But right now, I'm thinking of this raid on the marijuana. I understand that the state officials in Kentucky would like to prosecute, or let the federal government do a lot of that prosecuting, rather than handle it locally.

Interviewer: Right. Rather than get involved. [End Side A. Begin Side B.] Interviewer: And since your early education, I understand that you have gone on in these latter years while you were teaching and furthered your education. Can you fill us in on that, please? 31:00Geoghegan: My experience is not too different from most of the other people who taught, who began teaching at the time that I did. Except that I did make the eight grades in seven years, and high school in three years. Which people are probably not allowed to do now. And then I had two years of college. And many other teachers began with just one year of college. In fact, some of them began at the same time I did, began teaching, passing the teachers' examination without even finishing high school. And were licensed or certificated to teach for a certain number of years. When I had two years of college, I received a standard certificate certifying that I was capable of teaching any subject in any grade one through twelve, in any public school in Kentucky. And incidentally, that same certificate was accepted in other states. I began teaching in Jefferson County, 32:00and while I taught every year until I retired in 1980, I did, worked to finish my bachelor's degree. (Western?) in August of '35, and my master's in University of Kentucky in '54. Since I taught in Jefferson County, I took a number of courses at the University of Louisville for information that I wanted to acquire. Since 1980, I've been retired. That is practically the same experience as everybody I've talked to has had. Teaching and going to school, teaching and going to school.

Interviewer: Getting back to this time during Prohibition, you didn't mention a whole lot about the moonshiners. Was that a pretty large activity at the time? 33:00Geoghegan: Yes, it was. But people were running short of money. And here they had a nice (?) and good (?), it was a sore temptation to set up a little still. Also, these men had worked at, so many men had worked at the distillery, they knew how it should be done. So these small stills were set up and run. And then it was, a lot of it was run into Louisville and sold there. Some of it was aged, I think. Some of it was made in unsanitary, I'm sure, conditions. And sometimes I've heard stories about the neighbor's hog or the owner's hog getting in and eating the mash, so you had some drunken hogs for a few hours. 34:00Now I cannot authenticate those stories, but I heard them. And they're very logical, considering that people were still using rail fences. And the wire fences were not in very good condition. A hog can put his nose under a fence and go through it if he wants to. And that's, I'm sure that slop had a very savory odor. So it was, I would say it was very commonplace from discussions, innuendo, that I heard as a child. Of course, I didn't hear much about it after I was away. Because of not having a car, I spent a great deal of time in Jefferson County. And then when I came home for the weekend and (?) Interviewer: Were these 35:00moonshiners, were they pretty much accepted amongst the people? Did they kind of overlook it, and well, that's just part of it?

Geoghegan: You wouldn't have had any neighbors if you didn't overlook it. In certain areas, at least. These people were hard up. I heard someone the other day say some member of the family had to be in the hospital. And there were bills to pay. And there was no social security. No family insurance. In fact, I had taught several years before I even heard of such a thing as health insurance. And when I did have some health insurance and needed to use it, I discovered that right quick as soon as they made a few payments, they found a loophole not to make any more payments. Because I hadn't been to a doctor within a certain limit of days. 36:00It was a day over when I went to see the doctor.

Interviewer: Well, Miss Geoghegan, you've given us a lot of good ideas here. And I want to see what your idea of the, why did you think this came about? Why do you think Prohibition came in this area?

Geoghegan: Well, I think I told you that it really was nationwide. It was global. And you notice Nelson County had never voted dry since then. And I'll go back a little further now. Some of the priests reported as saying that making whiskey was not a sin, or selling whiskey was not a sin. And basically I can see where he's basically right. The Bible does not say not to make whiskey. Whiskey wasn't known, but wine was made 37:00in Bible times. And I don't see anyplace it was condemned except maybe drinking it in excess was the same as drinking in excess in any other way. But for the moonshiners were protecting themselves by shooting. And the officers who were attempting to break up the moonshine were using guns. The priests in Nelson County are credited with having a meeting between some people and the officers. And now, and saying to them, "If he can run and get away, don't shoot. If you can run him down, catch him." For the people who were making whiskey, "If you can run 38:00and get away, run. If you get caught, take it. But don't shoot." I remember a man who lived in a house just below the old (Reddy?) School. The old (Reddy?) School was torn down, but it was on the same site as the (graded?) as the Bardstown school facilities now. The hill to the, I guess the northwest. You went down that little hill, and on the other side there was a little house. A man lived in it. As I remember him, his name was Smith, and he had a (?). He was somewhere around an illegal distillery, a moonshine. Officers came, he ran and he was killed, is a story that I was told as a child. I didn't know the man, but I had seen him. And of course he had a family. 39:00That stuck in my mind. Later on, Frank (Madden?) was a federal officer. He was somewhere, they approached a shine. One of the shiners killed him. And my parents had known him and his wife. They also, I also knew his children. So it was after that that the priests in Nelson County are credited with getting people to say that they would not do any shooting. And for that reason, I think that was a great thing that was done. Now does that--

Interviewer: Yeah, that's very good. No violence. In other words, no violence.

Geoghegan: The sin was the violence. And that, I think, is basically, I can go wholeheartedly 40:00with that. Now I think the abuse of alcohol, basically I think anybody that abuses food to the extent that I read about some of these very obese people, to me that is a sin just the same as the abuse of alcohol.

Interviewer: Right. The excess.

Geoghegan: Excess. That's my own personal feeling.

Interviewer: Well, that's more or less what I was going to ask you, your feeling about Prohibition.

Geoghegan: It was (?) is my feeling. Because of, back here it caused people, some people attempted to make whiskey using these galvanized tubs. You don't put that mash in galvanized tubs and have it ferment, because it forms a poison. 41:00Zinc? No, it's not zinc. I guess it would be lead poisoning. But whiskey made that way was poisonous. And men, I guess, went to (?), died from drinking that. But I don't think there was much of that kind of whiskey made in Nelson County, because the people who were making it knew better. They did not (?). Of course, it could have been sold someplace else and we wouldn't have heard of it. It could have happened here, and I wouldn't have heard about it. There's one story told which, to me, is amusing. No, I can't, I'm not real sure of the name of the people. But it was common talk that this family did operate a shine. And two officers unwisely pulled their car 42:00into the lot and parked the car and head down the hill. The daughter of the household ran out into the yard to ring the dinner bell. It wasn't dinner time. One of the officers grabbed her, hurried over and grabbed her to keep her from ringing the bell. And she clawed him and scratched him enough that somebody asked him if a wildcat had (hit?) him.

Interviewer: He was wise to that trick, wasn't he?

Geoghegan: He wasn't as wise at first as he was last.

Interviewer: Right.

Geoghegan: Now that, of course, there was no real violence there. The man was not injured, and the woman was not injured. She was not about 43:00to let him stop her from ringing that bell.

Interviewer: To warn her father and so forth--

Geoghegan: Her father and her brothers that were involved in it. I don't think it's wise to name names, because I might have forgotten in the years. And with the same family names and the wrong given name, somebody else can be maligned. (Cause I said?) I didn't do it. I don't think that the woman I was thinking of has any descendents. But her brothers do.

Interviewer: So you mentioned all these physical disabilities that may have come about when you got hold of bad moonshine. What about the moral aspects of Prohibition? How do you feel that, people were elated when it was over. 44:00Geoghegan: I think they were, that it was over. And of course, if you go back and read some of these books, like Zane Grey has written one about the flappers and so on. And he, I'm not sure how he, of course, he was writing from the Western part of the states. He was indicating the fact that a lot of social drinking went on, because it was the thing to do. Well, (you could tell?) if a person had a flask, that's where you get those hip flasks that somebody carried, molded to hold in his hip pocket. And that many people learned social drinking. And I know that there was drinking went on amongst the high school people when I was in high school. I did not see it, but I heard the talk. 45:00I was not involved in it, but I heard the talk. Now I know with kids now, they make things bigger than what they actually did. And I found that with children when I talk, they'd come in to tell something. And when I heard another version of it, or I saw something, it would be, the way they saw it and the way I saw it was entirely different. And some of these kids may have exaggerated drinking that did not really occur. Made it bigger than it did. And I suspect that some of that is still going on with the high school kids now. Some others.

Interviewer: There was my feeling that the excesses started during Prohibition. The consumption of alcohol was widespread, you know, and crime started then, and all the ills that went along with 46:00the excesses of alcohol.

Geoghegan: Now, there were people that drank. As I said, I was born and lived there, beside (?) Bardstown Road until I was ten, eleven years old, something like that. And I remember seeing two men on horseback coming out of Bardstown. Now they weren't racing their horses. But they were fighting each other, each one on his horse. And they were drinking. There's no question about that. And I either imagined it or I saw the flash of a knife. Because I do know that at one time, one of those men cut the other one. And whether it occurred that same day, or whether in my mind the two incidents are 47:00implied because it happened a long time ago. They were neighbors. They'd been to Bardstown. But that was really while whiskey was still legal. There was a saloon somewhere in town (?) on Third Street, but I don't know where it was. practically all the business places were on Third Street, between the courthouse and Broadway at that time. (Grigsby's?), of course, was on (?) and (Connor and Haven?) were on (Plazay?). But most of the businesses were on Third Street. And what is now the (stapletons?) was a livery stable where you could pay a fee and leave your horse and buggy. It was like parking your car in a parking lot. You paid more of a fee if you wanted your horse fed 48:00at noon time. And you had a better chance if there was a crowd in town of getting him to take care of your horse if you did want him to feed the horse. (?) money got the horse taken care of. The school fair, I guess it was 1915, I was not old enough to go to school, but a (?), a schoolteacher, was boarding at our house. Mother used the horse and buggy to take her into the school fair, because the man that (?) was a friend of the family. He would take care of the horse. It seemed to me awfully crowded. When you're that little, there's an awful lot of big people.

Interviewer: That's right. everything makes a big impression on you, doesn't it?

Geoghegan: I didn't get in town too often to see a crowd 49:00of people.

Interviewer: Miss Lucille, this has been very enlightening, and we certainly appreciate you coming here today and sharing your memories of Prohibition. Is there anything else you would like to add in closing?

Geoghegan: Well, I think this is, you asked how widespread it was. We lived on a farm which my brother still owns, about maybe 1920 to 1935. And during the time of Prohibition, I have (?) that I could by walking around the house see about three or four little wisps of blue smoke going towards the sky. And I don't think there was a house there. They were not on our land. Maybe across the river. 50:00Now, does that tell you a little bit about it being widespread?

Interviewer: Right. And you knew to stay away from that little wisp of smoke.

Geoghegan: And I didn't tell it that I'd seen that little wisp of smoke. Because somebody else might tell an officer.

Interviewer: That's right.

Geoghegan: And we lived in the community. And we got along with the people in the community.

Interviewer: Right. So more or less keep quiet.

Geoghegan: Yes. I know people had to make a living. There was no welfare. And they had a choice of stealing or making a living that way. Some of them. Now some of them did really improve their economic status. There were people who owned good farms, (paid the money?) to buy those farms by making whiskey, and running it into Louisville. The ones I know are all dead. But their children and grandchildren are living. And 51:00one of my friends wrote a book. And some of the descendents from (?) , she admired the person she wrote it about. And they say she, his descendents say she made up a lot of it. They said, "We're law abiding citizens, we're trying to raise our children right, and we'd just as soon it wasn't publicized." That's a part of our heritage. In other words, it hasn't been published, but it's been written.

Interviewer: Well, maybe in time.

Geoghegan: (?) Interviewer: Oh, you do. Maybe in time we can all share it.

Geoghegan: (?) Interviewer: Well, thank you again, Miss Geoghegan. [End Interview.]