The Life of Della Jacobs - Part 3f, Bert Frank

When Prohibition was enacted in 1919 it did not stop Bert Frank from drinking, it only redirected the way he went about it. He made his own corn whiskey, and as he produced more then he could consume, he naturally fell into the entrepreneurial spirit of the country and began marketing it.

He set up his still in the basement of their house in Hooven. He made five or six batches a month and that produced three gallons of White Lightening. Mom didn't remember much about the still or its operation, but recalled he used lightening rods off barns for something. One time he got drunk and went to sleep so Mom’s brother Charlie finished distilling the whiskey. Grandma (below) delivered quart bottles of the stuff to a dentist or doctor in Cincinnati. She took the train and was usually accompanied by a neighbor lady.
The drinking got worse, his mental state steadily deteriorated. The violent spells became more frequent, and the family lived in constant fear. Mom said she came to hate him. He beat Grandma, sometimes brutally, and one time he made the three kids sit in chairs while he sharpened his straight razor. He was drunk, and repeatedly threatened to cut their throats, one by one. Mom remembered being so frightened that her mouth went dry. She sat there afraid to move, afraid to draw attention to herself. All she could think about was how thirsty and scared she was.

The family moved to Connersville, Indiana in July 1922. Bert got a good job as the fireman at the electric plant. He worked there for a couple of years and quit. He mostly roamed around, and Mom didn't think he had any kind of a permanent job after that. She knew that Grandma didn’t get any support as she had to take in boarders and do laundry to make ends meet.

His mental condition kept getting worse, eventually degenerating to the point where he won't eat anything Grandma cooked. On one occasion he tore up most of the furniture in the house. The most violent episode occurred in 1924. He threw the dinner out into the yard and beat Grandma and his oldest son, Charlie. Later he woke thinking he had killed Grandma.

Mom’s half-brother, Art Lancaster, got the family back together. The following Sunday while the rest were at the grocery, Art confronted Grandpa about his drinking. Bert threw an iron at him. It bounced off the wall and stuck in the floor. Art hit him over the head with a glass bowl. They wrestled to the floor and Art ended on top and choked Pop into submission. Grandpa laid on a cot in the basement for a day or two and then his son, Joe, drove him to his brother’s home in Whitewater, OH. The family didn't see much of him after that.

He may have come back to Connersville one more time. One night during an electrical storm with lots of lightening and thunder, they a saw man that resembled my Grandfather standing on the street corner. He stood there in the rain a long time looking at the house, and finally moved on. Pieces of news came their way. Someone said he was hanging out at rough beer joints along the Ohio River, places called “Speak Easies” during Prohibition.

He probably drank anything with alcohol in it, and eventually got hold of some bad stuff. A popular drink during Prohibition was made from an extract of Jamaica Ginger. In the U.S. the concoction was called “Jake”. Some bootleggers laced it with a substance meant to fool import regulators at the Treasury Department. The additive was thought to be harmless, but many unlucky consumers discovered it to be toxic. It caused a paralysis known as "Jake Leg", a condition in which the afflicted walked with a odd gait in which the toe touched the ground before the heel. He never recovered. Bert Frank died at the University of Cincinnati Hospital on June 24, 1935. He was 54 years old.
GO TO: Part 4a, The Move to Kokomo, Indiana