News of the tragedy was received in Gadsden early Friday morning by telephone.” He was shot three times in the head and shoulders, his throat was cut from ear to ear, his head being almost severed from the body and he was beaten about the head and body in a frightful manner. John Davis, bartender and manager of Spoon Motlow’s saloon at Mountainboro, was murdered and robbed in his place of business last Thursday night. 20, 1906 – John Davis Murdered In a Most Brutal Way Near Boaz. The saloons were very popular, causing the crime rate in Etowah County to reach a very high rate by mid-1907. Many popular saloons were located on Broad Street, as well as in Attalla. The Echols family lived on the second floor over the saloon.Īnother saloon, Nugent’s in Attalla, also did business with the Motlow distillery.īack then Gadsden had a crockery industry, and it is plausible that saloons had their own jugs manufactured with their names cut into the crockery while the clay was still soft before the baking and glazing were done.ĭuring the early 1900s, Etowah County was a “wet” county, meaning it was legal to sell alcoholic beverages such as beer and whiskey. Echols, Pure Wines and Liquors, Gadsden, Ala.”Įchols had a saloon at Broad and Court streets in the building once occupied by Hagedorn’s store. Cut in the crockery is the inscription, “W. There was an old whiskey jug popularly used in the early days by saloonkeepers that contained Motlow’s famous drink. Sulphur water that had a “terrible odor” poured from the old mines through a pipe. The street on the western boundary of the property was known as Red Row. The main building was two stories high with an exterior of vertical planking, painted red. Many Gadsden residents remembered the old distillery and its buildings and how they looked around 1915.
The distillery produced corn whiskey known as Black Jack and was famous for the Coosa River “Lincoln County Process” brand of sour mash whiskey.Ī 1910 insurance map of Gadsden shows that the plant was “not in operation since 1908.” A notation on a 1915 map states, “buildings now vacant and in dilapidated condition.” Judging from the number of buildings on the property the Motlows must have done a thriving business. The main building was a large two-story structure with an exterior of vertical planking. Ten buildings were erected, including a reservoir that was necessary for distilling the Coosa River Corn Whiskey. The Gadsden Distilling Company then became a reality. In the fall of 1903, Motlow sold one-third of his interest in the distillery to Lem Motlow and one-third to W.S. His product was to be called Coosa River Corn Whiskey, distilled from waters from Standifer Springs, using the Lincoln County process from Tennessee.
Spoon Motlow paid $1,365 for the Tuscaloosa Avenue tract and began making plans to build a distillery. It was known as Red Row and later named Essex Street. N Alford sold to Spoon Motlow 2.73 acres of land located at 5th Street and Tuscaloosa Avenue.įifth Street of that day was located about one block east of its present location. Old map photographs depict Spoon’s saloon to be in the 400 block of Broad Street. That was just before he decided to do what Lem was doing – getting into the distilling business. In about 1890 Lem’s brother, Spoon Motlow, moved to Gadsden from Lynchburg, Tenn., to open the Spoon Motlow Saloon. In 1907, due to failing health, Jack Daniel gave the distillery to his nephew. Lem had a head for numbers, and was soon doing all of the distillery’s bookkeeping.
Jack took his favorite nephew, Lem Motlow, under his wing. The first three were engaged in the liquor business in one way or another. The couple had 10 children, including Lem, Spoon, Frank and Thomas. If the 1850 date is correct, he might have become a licensed distiller at the age of 16. Jasper Newton “Jack” Daniel was born in September 1850, although seemingly no one knows the exact date because the birth records were destroyed in a courthouse fire. Known for its square bottles and black label, Jack Daniel’s is a brand of Tennessee whiskey that is among the world’s best-selling liquors.