BOSS' BEST DAY: PENDERGAST FROWNS CROC TEARS AS TOWN GOES DRY!
By Bjorn Skaptason, Tom's Town Historian
KANSAS CITY, MO, 1920: The best day in Tom Pendergast’s life was arguably the day he hung up the “closed” sign, and turned the lights out at Pendergast Wholesale Liquors, January 17, 1920. Prohibition was supposed to close down the gin joints and saloons that drew so many good citizens down into debauchery, and Tom was content to play along – as long as the debauchery continued.
Tom’s liquor distribution warehouse, located just across the tracks behind Union Station, was always just part of his multifaceted portfolio. Tom made bottles. Tom made booze. Tom distributed booze. Tom owned hotels and saloons of the high and the low variety, and Tom got a taste of the gambling racket. Tom was Kansas City’s ultimate vertical marketer. It would seem that national prohibition of alcohol would put a damper on the Boss’ businesses.
Not so. Tom figured that people wanted to drink on January 17, just like they did on January 16. Tom also figured that since he and his brothers had spent the last two decades slowly seizing control of all the city offices – the Mayor’s Office, the city legislature, the streetcars, and most importantly, the police – that he’d be ok. The levers that enforced Prohibition in Kansas City were already in Tom Pendergast’s hands. Whether they ever turned was entirely up to him. They never did.
There were compromises to be made. Signs came down off saloons and windows darkened behind heavy curtains. Soon coffee shops and soda fountains opened in storefronts, offering no explanation for the 80% of the enterprise that lay behind the unmarked door. Otherwise, nothing changed. Revelers roamed the streets at all hours. The rich strains of Jazz and Blues filled every corner of the city most every night. Cheers and curses of the gamers echoed down 12th Street from basement casinos. Behind the unmarked gates of the shuttered Pendergast Wholesale Liquors men still moved products out the doors. Boss Tom’s trucks arrived empty, and left full. Orders were delivered and the money flowed in.
January 17, 1920 was the day America turned off the spigot and went dry. It was the best day in Boss Tom Pendergast’s life.