Prohibition in the Upper Peninsula

Temperance workers had their work cut out for them in the Upper Peninsula. It was a wild and woolly place where moonshiners, bootleggers and rumrunners thrived. Al Capone and the Purple Gang came north to keep Canadian whiskey passing through Sault Ste. Marie to Chicago and Detroit. Federal enforcement agent John Fillion double-crossed both his office and the bootleggers. The Grand Hotel on Mackinac Island survived due to gambling and fine Canadian whiskey brought in by rumrunners, sometimes assisted by the Coast Guard. Author Russell M. Magnaghi dives into the raucous history of Yooper Prohibition.

Russell M. Magnaghi, award-winning historian of Michigan’s Upper Peninsula, is the author of over a dozen books on the U.P. His most recent book is Upper Peninsula Beer: A History of Brewing Above the Bridge. A graduate of the University of San Francisco and St. Louis University, Russell taught history for forty-five years at Northern Michigan University. He and his wife, Diane, reside in Marquette and Traverse City, Michigan.

Arcadia Publishing, 2017

paperback, 144 pages, 76 Black And White images, 6 (w) x 9 (h)