One of our members, one of you all and it fits neatly into our institutions history. For nearly 200 years, our Historic House has served as an Important CommunityGathering Place or prominent cincinnati families such as those of martin baum, nicholas longworth, David Simpson and of course carl and anna taft. Each resident played an Important Role in shaping the history, art of cincinnati and this series celebrates their legacies aswell as the new ways our city continues to evolve and change. The complete schedule of all our fall programs including our upcoming lunch and learns are available on our website which is taftmuseum. Org. Today we have author of newly released book the bourbon king the life and crimes of george remus, prohibitions evil genius. Bob batchelor is here to share with us the story of george remus, the king who built the bourbon empire that stretched from his cincinnati matching mansion across america at the dawn of prohibition. Batchelor is a critically acclaimed bestselling cultural historian and biographer. He has published widely on American History and literature including hooks on stanley, bob dylan, the great gatsby, madmen and the great update. He earned his bachelors in literature at university of south florida and teaches in the media, journalism and Film Department at Miami University in oxford ohio and lives in blue ash ohio. Following the talk we have blue manatee literacy project on site with copies of the bourbon king available for purchase. Through unique partnerships in the book department, we can donate books to disadvantagedreaders every time a book is purchased through the organization so by purchasing a book for yourself or a loved one today you are also helping a young reader in the need. Mister batchelor will answer questions one on oneand assign copies of the book following the lecture. We are so delighted to present this book to you. Please join me in welcoming Bob Batchelor to the taft museumof art. [applause] thank you. I cant think of a better place in cincinnati than the taft museum to talk about george remus. A lot of you were asking questions before we began about what is the quote connection between the tafts and george remus and if i forget, somebody please ask that question. Im a historian. I love big dates. I love centennials, hundred anniversary celebrations so as we prepare for the hundredth anniversary of the jazz age and the hundredth anniversary of the volstead act and prohibition, there isnt a better time then to study somebody whose history has really forgotten. You might be surprised because some of us in the area have heard of george remus. There are cincinnati and, i get approached all the time when people find out on written this book and they say my greatgrandfather he was a paperboy and george remus gave him a 10 tip and thats when it was a lot of money. We saw him working out at the Athletic Club and theres a lot of remus sightings, a lot of remus interest in this area but once you go outside the cincinnati region theres almost no recognition at all so one of the goals in writing this book was to bring this fascinating character to life. Its an interesting set of circumstances around george remus so we will have a little discussion about that. The first thing people ask me whenever i, they determine im writing the bourbon king is how did you get interested in this . How did you come across george remus and 17 years ago, a very prominent historian named Stanley Custer who became famous for writing about watergate, he was editing a reference collection. Many of you might have used it in school. Its called a dictionary of American History and thats where teachers used to send her to find out about about American History and he said would you mind writing a little essay on bootleggers. Why would we want to talk about that . In that research, 17 years ago, i ran across remus and like a bad song from the 1980s, in my head for 17 years. I was going not thinking about this guy and later i wrote this biography integrates kathy. I treated the novel as if it were a person and i wrote a book about this experience, this Great American novel and remus again comes up because some people say remus was the model, some sayhe was a model for jay gatsby. Ran across remus again so when i was looking from the next book project i thought to myself i want to discover somebody whos been forgotten , whose story can tell us something so interesting about todays world and you can learn so much about what were facing in the 2020s on studying the 1920s so remus became it and thats how we get togeorge remus. I think im probably not telling you anything you dont know but there are no heroes in the story. Its a very complex story with a lot of bad characters. Even people who seem good for a really long time all of a sudden, i would read a new story or Something Else in the paper. Six months after they were doing something heroic, theyre doing something terrible. Im like, whats wrong with these people . But theyre incredibly complex, just like we are today and it helps us understand the 1920s. It helps us understand today so were going to dive into george remus, the bourbon king. The story is large and theres no way we could go through this whole story. I think the audiobook if youre into audiobooks, its like 16 hours long and we cant tell all the stories here. I thought i would boil it down to six numbers. These six numbers will give you a flavor of george remus and hopefully make you want to learn morebecause its a fascinating story. The first number is number 13. The number 13 is significant because george remus was a german immigrant and his family after bouncing around a little bit settledin chicago. At age 13, remus had to become the man of the family because his father had some Health Problems and some drinking problems. We are not supposed to talk about those. But remuss father had problems. He could not support the family so remus takes over at age 13. He had to drop out of school. Luckily for him, his uncle owned a pharmacy in suburban chicago and because of that connection george started working and he worked really hard. It was a smart kid before he had to drop out of school. He was really athletic even though he wouldnt look i can athlete, he was about five foot five, well under 200 pounds. He was built like a fire hydrant buthe was an amazing athlete. He did athletic feats that im sure none of us could have done on our best days so its aninteresting side story. Remus begins this career in the pharmacy and when he comes of age, he passes the licensure to become a pharmacist. The interesting thing is that this places george remus at the heart of the community because at that time in the early 1900s,pharmacists were more like smalltown doctors. These immigrant communities and these poor clients that he had poor patrons came to remus with their problems and came to him when they had an eight or pain because they couldnt afford regular doctors so the pharmacy became the doctor you went to. He liked the attention. He liked the money and when he passed the licensurewhich he lied to get his license. Eli then and made himself two years older. He lied to say he was 21 because, this is an interesting point, if he thought that a regulation or rule were unjust, he disobeyed it. So to him made no sense that if a 19yearold couldnt be licensed if you can pass the test you should get your license. Within a year or so after getting his license he bought his uncles pharmacy and another pharmacy so this is a guy who really is ambitious. Remember, german immigrants dropped out of school. This was the best life that he could have. He was already gaining wealth. He started speculating inreal estate deals. There interesting early history. But what george remus does around 1902 is decide ive had enough of the pharmacy, even though hes more successful probably than anybody else he knows and he decides to become a lawyer, of all things. Medicine wasnt for him, he thought it was quackery so he decides to become a lawyer because george remus was a person saw himself as bigger thanlife. He was like a character out of history who determines really early i want to be president of the United States and works hard to get to that position. Remus saw himself in these terms. I want to be bigger than life and to him, becoming a lawyer was a step in that direction. So the number two number that i will give you, its 300. 300 is important because after remus became one of the most famous criminal Defense Attorneys in america, he moves from chicago to cincinnati because within that 300 mile radius from cincinnati just like today, its the gateway to bourbon country and remus realized as a criminal defense attorney that if these petty thugs that im defending who have violated prohibition can pay their fines by whipping out rules of hundred dollar bills and just tearing them off the top and paying the judge on the spot, if these knuckleheads can make hundreds or thousands, if i apply my genius to this principle, i can make millions or tens of millions and thats how george remus who is one of the best criminal Defense Attorneys in america, already famous across the United States goes to the dark side. Cincinnati is his gateway and he set up headquarters half a mile from here at the old fenton hotel so theres a hint. First connection to the tasks, the fenton hotel owned by the taft family and that is remuss headquarters for his entire run through the 1920s. He always keeps a suite of room at that hotel, even after hes rich enough to buy the remus building which is just down the street. Its not a football parking lot but thats okay, it was there. Theres a put picture in the book of the old remus building so youwill see that when you check out the book. 300 mile radius, the best bourbon in the world. And remus realized because he had been a pharmacist and because he was such a stellar lawyer, there arelegal ways to get alcohol into the marketplace. They called it medicinal alcohol. And bourbon isnt that great. I want some medicinal alcohol. Isnt it great that in that timeframe , there wasnt the scientific advancement we had now and there are some therapeutic benefits to alcohol. There are uses for that, especially in an era in which a lot of advancements have yet to be made. Remus knew from his own days as a pharmacist that doctors and pharmacists could write prescriptions and it allowed people even during prohibition to take out a little bit of whiskey or bourbon or other substance once a week. So if he got access to those whiskey certificates, thats what they were called. If i get access to these whiskey certificates, i can take this alcohol out of the government warehouses put into the marketplace. But at the same time, remember criminal mastermind, have prohibitions evil genius. At the same time remus realized if i hire my own men to rob my other men at gunpoint, i can take this legal bourbon and i can take it into theblack market. So he sets up a series of distribution points. His major distribution points is a place that comes to be known as death valley because he had it fortified like an army fort. He had hired an army as he started to make money and this is about say 13 miles northeast, northwest of the city. He sets up on an old farm and then sets up smaller depots all over cincinnati. All these places that many of you have traveled. He had a depot in hamilton. He had a depot in lindale. He had different locations throughout this area where he then fanned out nationwide and he built this empire really from this 300 mile gateway out into a national marketplace. One journalist at the time quoted george remus is to bourbon what jd rockefeller was to oil and remus, why i think hes an evil genius is he understood business even though he had no Business Training outside of running his own pharmacy. So he set up a system that he called the circle, like jd rockefeller. If you control production, you control distribution, you control pricing, you control every piece of thecircle , then you make all the money. And remus found ways to make all the money and its very interesting. Many of you have probably visited the bourbon trail. I visited, my wonderful wife and i love to go down to bourbon country and see the tours. When they give you the two are and they start to mumble and fumble, when they 1920 and theyre not quite sure how to explain it, these were very proud families and still today very proud people that run the distilleries. Its one of americas Great Industries but in 1920, the thing that happened that they dont want to talk about when you go to bourbon country is that probably george remus come in and found a way to buy up that bourbon and get into the black market. So my thinking as the george remus story becomes more public is that the distiller should embrace this story. Its part of their history. Theres nothing you can do about it now, you might as well dig in and find out what the truth was. They were proud people and the National Government had just declared them public enemy number one. They could have wished for fire or electricity, a Lightning Strike was the only thing that was going to save them. Their entire inventories were basically worth nothing so remus which is a strange thing, theres some people myself included that believe remus in some ways even though he was doing all behindthescenes and black market, remus saved the bourbon industry by giving at least some Foundation Throughout prohibition. This is a long 13 years for america and remus gave the bourbon industry a little bit of a slide through that era. So thats my number two number, 300. This next number might blow you out of yoursocks a little bit but bear with me. 9. 62 billion. Thats a large number. 9. 62 billion is the number, if you calculated the high end, todays money, what remus was able to acquire in2 and a half years. 9. 62 billion. This is as if george remus founded facebook or google or a hightech company and into and a half years old it into one of the Biggest Companies in the world in 2 and a half years, all from his mansion in price hill. It is an amazing asset of the story. I think if people realize because in todays world where all number by numbers. Somebody says that persons a millionaire, big deal. Hundred millionaire, maybe that starts to get our attention but remus and the high end was in excess of 200 million in 1920 money which you use the latest economic calculations, 9. 62is kind of the midrange. It could have been more than that. There are stories that george remus and his men made so much money so quickly their suits were stuffed with hundreds of thousands of dollars because the banks wouldnt accept any more deposits each day. They had limitations. Theyre running around with their giant stacks stuffed in their coats because what you do with the money . Its coming in so fast that they cant even make a place to hide it all. Its pretty amazing, and what this 9. 62 billion dollars allowed george to do was as we can imagine, live a big life in a tower. He built an army. He built a nationwide Distribution Network and he lived like a king. He bought the old lachman estate in price hill and basically gutted it and put countless amounts of money into remodeling that mansion. He made it into one of cincinnatis most Beautiful Homes and he invited the cream of the crop and another tied to the tafts, they never accepted his invitations to the pricehill mansion but he always invited them. The centerpiece of the price hill mansion was our force number, hundred 75,000. This is a highend number when people say how much did george remus pay for the inground pool he put in, hundred 75,000 in 1920 money. It was luxurious. Perfumed water, special heating units and this allowed him really to live a gatsby lifestyle. Love to come to the mansion and swim in the pool and see the pool. It was quite a thing at that time and in 1920, when you want to be fabulous, what did you line your pool with . You lined it with rookwood tile because thats the mark of having made. This was remuss signature. Rookwood tile lining the pool, hundred 75,000. The parties he threw became a legendary. The papers didnt cover them that much so people will tell you and you may have heard all the newspapers covered. There are lots of reporters there. They really didnt. It became part of folklore and so much of the remus story is built on folklore and people telling other people and recollections later to one of the things i was able to do as a historian is dig through all these materials that five years ago , nobody could have done or 10 years ago because today because of digital resources you can pull together different story, the newspaper articles. You can pull together archival information and kind of look at the remus story like a giant literary historical detective jigsaw puzzle. So i spent a long time piecing together these stories. The mansion becomes a center point of that. The night they debuted the pool to the public which george called the imaging back after his second wife, Imogene Remus who is a femme fatale and also not a sweetheart. She is very much an interesting person and she targeted george when they met in chicago. One of my favorite quotes, soon after meeting george remus, imogene said to one of her friends, im going to roll him for his role. Marry him if i have to but im going to roll him for his role. Youre going to roll him for a role, see because remus was surrounded by these thugs didnt talk like that. When you see a transcript, they put the cd in there and the right so its fun to read. Imogene was a person who wanted to be famous and in the early 20th century, you got fame by being in the newspapers. So one of the things i uncovered that people hadnt seen before , i was able to track back for about a decade. She kept using different personas and different identities to change her personality and to change who she was and tried to get into the newspaper. So one time she might try to get into the newspaper as dusty holmes which was her first marriage name and nickname. Other times she might be mrs. Jean holmes, other times she used imogene.