Homeowners Discover Prohibition-Era Booze Under Their Floorboards

There are very few people around who remember prohibition, although there are still many stories that circulate. It seems as if those stories are still coming in, and one is coming straight out of Ames, New York. Homeowners found something straight out of history that is amazing on many levels.

Nick Drummond and Patrick Bakker have been living in the rural home they named Bootlegger Bungalow for a year. It seems as if a bootlegger built the home, but they had a hard time fully believing it until they discovered something interesting.

Nick said that he was removing some rotted wood skirting that went around the foundation of the home. As he was peeling the wood back on the sides, hay fell out and he wondered what it could be. He said: “At first I was like, ‘Oh this must be insulation’ – of course all this is taking place within a few seconds in my head – and then I look and I’m like ‘Well, wait a second, what’s that glass thing?’”

At that point, he found himself looking at an old liquor bottle and more tops were popping out of the hay. When he looked back in the wall, another package was inside and tied up like a string. He then realized his “WALLS ARE BUILT OF BOOZE!”

All in all, 66 bottles of Scottish whiskey were hidden during the prohibition area. They were located within the floorboards and the walls of that little shack that was originally a mudroom where shoes and coats would be stored.

Bakker said it was like finding the jackpot. It was something you would always want out of the house!

Count Adolf Humpfner was the bootlegger who originally lived on the property. Newspapers at the time said how he was involved in many scandals and often made the headlines. According to Drummond, he died suddenly and mysteriously, leaving all of the alcohol in place.

“I mean, the guy had a buffalo robe,” Drummond said, according to Simplemost. “I don’t even know what that was. But I’m just imagining this tall, heavyset German guy walking around in a buffalo robe surrounded by dozens of cash registers … It’s fantastic, I love it, I love thinking about that.”

Drummond and Bakker are continuing to renovate the home but they want to preserve the history as well. They feel that every building is its own story and it’s just a matter of looking behind what is there to see the history of everything.

A couple of the damaged bottles are being kept by the homeowners but they are going to sell the rest to collectors. Each of the bottles is worth anywhere from $4 up to $1200.

“At the end of the day, we’re just sitting and we’re like, ‘We really like the house so much more now,’” Bakker said, as Simplemost reported.