My great-grandma Lillian Phalen turned 100-years-old in September 2020! To put this number into perspective for my 12-year-old daughter, I asked her to recall what she’d learned in history class about the years around 1920. The US was still recovering from WWI and the Spanish Flu. People didn’t have televisions, they had radios, and movies were silent. Things have sure changed.
These days Lil’s memory isn’t so good, as tends to happen when you hit 100. Still, even at her age she can remember so many of the crazy stories she has told about her family. Lillian came from a big family of 12 kids. She was the youngest of the girls and is the last of her siblings still around. Of all of her family, one of the people she always spoke fondly of was her daddy, Ebbie Gilbert.
Who was Ebbie Gilbert?
Edward Gilbert was born in 1881 in Wolfe County, Kentucky. In 1885, when Ebbie was four years old, his father, George Gilbert, died. That left Ebbie the man of the house, looking after his mother, Sarah, his twin sister Lizzie and his baby sister Rebecca.
Being the man didn’t last long. Ebbie’s mother went on to remarry, divorce, and remarry again. There are no more census records that list him or his sisters living with Sarah. This means they were probably sent to live with a relative. All we know for sure is that Ebbie definitely grew up in Kentucky. He was a proud bluegrass man through and through.
Prohibition Hits Kentucky
Fast forward to November 1919. The state of Kentucky voted on whether or not to add an amendment to their constitution banning the distribution of alcohol. This was two months before prohibition began across the country. By that time, Ebbie had grown up. His WWI draft registration listed him as medium height and weight with black hair and blue eyes. He was handsome, funny and loved his growing family. In 1902 he had married Mary Belle Jameson and started farming in Flat, Kentucky. If you look Flat up on a map, it’s a tiny dot somewhere just south of Campton, Kentucky. They were deep in the hills of hillbilly country and they were proud.
When prohibition began, their family of ten lived in a small farmhouse with another baby (Lillian) on the way. An innovative farmer, Ebbie worked hard to put enough food on their table. However, to unwind he liked to drink, and this new prohibition thing wasn’t his style. So what did he do? You guessed it. He started making his own homemade whiskey, affectionately called bootlegging, and he was good at it.
Ebbie’s Bootlegging Business
I’m not sure if he launched his new hobby as soon as prohibition hit or after a few dry years. I also don’t know if his “distillery” was a solo act or if he had friends in on the deal. I do know his family owned a coal mine where he sourced the coal needed to heat his product. And I know his moonshine was known in the area as the quality stuff. Ebbie had discovered a new, lucrative talent. Mary wasn’t complaining… mostly.
Lil likes to tell a story about her first run-in with moonshine. She was about 3-years-old. Her momma was out running an errand leaving Ebbie alone with all of the kids. Lil was a typical curious 3-year-old and must have gotten nosy about what her dad was sipping on. So, what did Ebbie do? He gave her a couple of sips of moonshine, of course! It wasn’t much, but Lillian still remembers her momma “getting after” Ebbie when she came home to find her 3-year-old acting especially goofy and tipsy with the smell of moonshine on her breath.
The Big Choice
Clearly, while he was resourceful, Ebbie wasn’t the most responsible when he was younger. So it will come as no surprise that the moonshine didn’t flow forever. Around 1926 or 1927, the law caught up with him. According to the story, the state of Kentucky offered Ebbie a choice. Spend the next 6 months in jail or pay a fine and leave the state. He decided it was better to leave.
In 1927, Ebbie, Mary, and their younger kids packed up and moved north to Forest County, Wisconsin. Why choose Wisconsin? Their official reason is that they had family in the area. The unofficial reason… rumor had it that bootlegging laws weren’t enforced in the Northwoods. So, for the next 6 years until prohibition ended, Ebbie continued making his moonshine and, as hoped for, the law looked the other way.
Ebbie and Mary’s family continued to grow, and everyone settled into their new Wisconsin life. Most of them stayed there, including Lil, who still lives there. I don’t think she drinks moonshine anymore, though!
Sources
“Revisiting Prohibition: Kentucky was ahead of the times” by Jim Warren in Lexington Herald Leader, 10/18/2011.
“Sarah Elizabeth Tolson (1862-1953) — marriages” by StevenMyers362 originally shared on ancestry.com on 01 Mar 2012.
Photo Credit
Header photo by Maurício Mascaro from Pexels.
Additional photos from archives of Lillian Phalen.
