Shore Lore: How Prohibition Changed Ventura Country

The exhibition starts on May 21, 2020

Shore Lore: How Prohibition Changed Ventura County

Rumrunners Delivered the Good Stuff to America’s Speakeasies

Rumrunning, the organized smuggling of imported whiskey, rum and other liquor by sea and overland to the United States, started within weeks after Prohibition took effect on January 17, 1920. People still wanting to wet their whistles in illegal speakeasies and at home were rejecting foul-tasting and dangerous locally made industrial alcohol being passed off as the real thing. They were demanding quality, authentic Scotch and other liquor “right off the boat.”