Boh Beer and
Officer Bob
by Don Drewniak
Fall River, Massachusetts
had its own brewing company, Enterprise Brewery,
which began operations in 1894. In 1911, it
merged with two other Fall River breweries, the
King Phillip Brewing Company (1898) and the Old
Colony Brewing Company (1896). The newly formed
entity first operated as the Enterprise Brewery,
and then as the Old Colony Brewing Company.
Five other breweries
operated within Fall River during the 1870s and
1880s, the city’s early cotton manufacturing
boom years. The beer was delivered in kegs to
local bars and restaurants in horse drawn wagons.
Prohibition brought a
temporary halt to Fall River’s brewing days.
With the end of Prohibition in 1933, A.F.
Haffenreffer, Sr. modernized and reopened the Old
Colony brewing complex located at the corner of
President Avenue and Davol Street, a short
distance from the Taunton River. It was named
Enterprise Brewing and produced Old Tap Lager Ale
and Bohemian Lager Beer, better known as Boh Beer,
as well as several other beers with similar names.
Enterprise Brewery closed its doors in 1963.
Three weeks after I
transferred from the Laurel Lake School to Slade
School when I was in fourth grade, a second kid,
Carl, also transferred into my class. He
continued on at the Slade School through grade
eight, though in different classes from me.
He went on to Diman
Vocational High School and became an excellent
automobile mechanic by the time he was sixteen.
This was due not only to his training at Diman,
but to his having lived next door to a used car
dealership that serviced the cars it bought and
sold. Much of his free time was spent in the
garage both learning about and helping with
repairs. He eventually left Diman and went to
work there as an auto mechanic.
He was a founding member of
the Imperials Automobile Safety Club when I
joined the club. He owned the best car of any
member, a ’57 white Chevy convertible.
Carl had an uncle who
worked as a night watchman at the brewery. Once
every two weeks or thereabouts during the spring
and summer months of 1960, three or four us would
pile into one of our cars and drive to the
brewery, arriving there shortly after 9:00PM.
Accompanying us were two
five quart galvanized pails. A twelve foot high
chain link fence sealed off a driveway that
separated two of the brewery’s buildings. We
parked the car next to the brewery and then Carl
and one of us who wasn’t driving would carry
the pails to the gate.
His uncle opened the gate,
took the empty pails and two dollars (the buyers
split the cost) and returned with the pails three
quarters filled with Boh Beer. None of us were
older than seventeen. The age to legally buy
alcohol in Massachusetts was twenty-one.
There was a daytime picnic
area alongside the Taunton River. With the
exception of occasional “parkers,” it
was usually empty at night. It became our illegal
drinking place of preference. Spanning the river
to the right were Fall River’s two iconic
bridges, the Slade’s Ferry Bridge and the
Brightman Street Bridge, both of which connected
Fall River to Somerset, Massachusetts.
From the days of my
earliest memories, I was fascinated by the Slade’s
Ferry Bridge that had been built in 1875 and
survived until 1970. It was a steel, double
decked truss bridge with a flat bottom that, at
most, was twelve feet above the river. It
included a swing span to allow river traffic to
pass through. The bottom deck was used for
vehicular traffic.
The fascination came from
the upper deck that carried rail traffic in its
earlier years. During my fledgling elementary
school days, I imagined a train was passing
overhead whenever I was in the car with my
parents while crossing the bridge.
Suppose it falls down
on us?
Headlights from behind our
car came into view on one of our beer-by-the-river
nights. Although the headlights made seeing
details of the car difficult and flashing red
lights were not turned on, there was no question
but that it was a police car. One of Fall River’s
finest stepped out the driver’s side and
made his way to our car. Carl was the driver that
night.
“What are you up to,
Carl?”
“Making sure no U-boats
are going to attack the city.”
“The War ended fifteen
years ago.”
“It’s been that
long, Bob?”
Bob? He’s calling
him Bob?
Meanwhile, Carl continued
to calmly sip his beer.
“I forgot that you’re
not old enough to remember the War. Any of your
friends here close to twenty-one?
“Not that I know of.”
Next came one of those
wondrous moments in life that can’t be
forgotten.
“Hey, Don, pass me a
cup with Boh in it,” Carl said in a matter
of fact tone.
He is out of his mind.
With my hand shaking, I
passed a cup to Carl who, in turn, passed it out
the window.
“Thanks,” said
Police Officer Bob as he took a sip. “I see
Boh is selling water these days. I’ve got a
shimmy in the front end of my Chevy. Any chance
you can take a look at it?”
“Anytime. Give me call.”
Officer Myers (I caught
sight of the name on his uniform) finished
downing the “water” and said, “I’ll
check with the wife and ring you tomorrow. One
more thing, you and your friends may want to find
a better spot to search for U-boats.”
Off he went. Life was
different in those days.
|
