Where were some of the Twin Cities’ most notorious speakeasies?

Listen and subscribe to our podcast: Apple Podcasts | Spotify

It appeared to be a barbershop. But hidden behind a wall of this Minneapolis business, illegal drinks fueled secret revelry in the 1920s.

What today is a kitschy bar called the Chatterbox Pub was once one of many speakeasies in the Twin Cities during Prohibition, according to its current owner. That history caught the interest of reader Charles Knutson, who lives nearby and wanted to know more about the illegal watering holes once scattered around the region.

Knutson sought answers from Curious Minnesota, the Star Tribune’s community reporting project inspired by reader questions.

Historians don’t know for certain how many speakeasies once operated in the Twin Cities because they left few records and came in so many different forms, according to Bill Convery, research director at the Minnesota Historical Society. Some were jazz clubs, while others operated out of little apartments and homes. And some, like the Hollyhocks Club on St. Paul’s Mississippi River Boulevard, were fancy establishments with waitstaff and patrons in formal attire.

The experiences that people had in Minneapolis and St. Paul’s Prohibition-era speakeasies depended on how much money they had to spend, Convery said. While some of the most notorious spots closed long ago, there are still at least a half dozen places open today that have a speakeasy history.

The United States went dry overnight in January 1920.

That didn’t mean it stopped being a part of social life. Instead, speakeasies — illicit, secret spots selling alcohol — popped up everywhere around the country. (The term came from the “speak softly shops” that illegally sold liquor in 19th-century England and Ireland, according to Encyclopaedia Britannica. Customers had to be quiet so shop owners wouldn’t get caught.)

Some of the era’s most famous speakeasies were in St. Paul, at a time when the city also was host to many notable gangsters. The Green Lantern speakeasy off Wabasha Street was a place gangsters would “check in” with the corrupt police force.

“It was the center of the criminal underworld,” Convery said about the Green Lantern. “Everybody knew about it, but nobody knew about it.”

Places like the Green Lantern also drew regular folks hoping to get a glimpse of gangsters, said Kim Johnson, who gives a “Gangsters, Bootleggers and Feds” tour. Infamous criminals like John Dillinger, the Barker family and Kid Cann were all known to frequent the Green Lantern before it closed in 1934.

The speakeasy also sold food, and the most popular menu items included spaghetti and a pork sandwich.

A couple named Josephine and William Lehman built the club deep inside the old silica mine tunnels, said Deborah Frethem, a longtime caves tour guide.

F. Scott Fitzgerald and his wife, Zelda, once were regulars at the speakeasy inside the Commodore Hotel on Western Avenue. It was known as a classy establishment with its “fanciful lighting, trimmed with curving deco lines, and full of mirrors,” according to the book “Closing Time” by Bill Lindeke and Andy Sturdevant. It is currently open as an event space.

Neumann’s in North St. Paul advertises itself as the “oldest bar in Minnesota” and has a colorful Prohibition history. The business opened its doors in 1887, selling exclusively Hamm’s beer. When 1920 rolled around, Neumann’s began to sell “near beer” in the front of the bar, with a secret speakeasy just up the stairs. That staircase still exists today.

Minneapolis also had its share of illegal spots. Shaw’s Bar and Grill on University Avenue NE. was once a drink shop where people could buy moonshine. In 1922, federal agents busted proprietor Edward Loskowski and sent him to jail, according to the Minneapolis Tribune.

The agents had spotted a drainage hose “at the baseboard of an ice box,” the paper wrote. When they followed it, they found a hidden can with 5 gallons of moonshine.

Prohibition created an underground economy that benefited criminals. If someone wanted alcohol, they could get it. The more money or power someone had, the easier it was.

“They thought that by eliminating alcohol, they would end crime altogether. Alcohol was seen as the root of all evil,” Johnson said. “Instead, they made criminals out of ordinary people.”

Some smugglers brought alcohol down from Canada. Often, that liquor was initially smuggled into Canada from places such as New York or New Jersey, according to Convery. Then it was relabeled as Canadian whisky to fetch a higher price and smuggled back into the country through Minnesota.

In July 1920, only a few months after the Volstead Act took effect, Duluth’s chief of police and a U.S. marshal were arrested on charges of smuggling. The group of suspected smugglers were acquitted, however.

One of the most popular liquors around the country at the time was a whiskey called the Minnesota 13 made by farmers in the St. Cloud area.

“If the feds came sniffing around, even the wife and the kids would do their best to try to hide everything,” Johnson said. “The priests and the local authorities kind of looked the other way, because they knew they were just trying to make a living.”

If you’d like to submit a Curious Minnesota question, fill out the form below:

Read more Curious Minnesota stories:

How Minnesota farmers kept booze flowing during Prohibition

How did Kid Cann become Minneapolis’ most infamous gangster?

Why is St. Paul located where it is? Hint: It involves liquor

Why does Minnesota have municipal liquor stores?