So I was doing my usual Google Blog Search this morning, looking for any interesting chatter on the net about Jewish books.  I was scrolling through, and there were the usual book reviews, the typical news articles with a mention of “books” here and “Jewish” there, yadda yadda yadda.  Then, all of a sudden!  I see: “Book Patrol: ‘Speak a Jewish Word and Make an Extra Sale’“.  Huh?

Curious, I clicked on the link, and found myself reading a fascinating article about a piece of ephemeral American Judaica (ephemera is any piece of written or printed material not intended to be preserved, like a pamphlet, letter, or flyer).  Stephen J. Gertz writes:

My girlfriend’s father died recently and in amongst his belongings she found a curious pamphlet.

The Joseph Jacobs Handbook of Jewish Words and Expressions.  For use of anyone calling on the Jewish trade… for making friends with Jewish merchants was issued in 1954 by the Joseph Jacobs Organization, an U.S. advertising agency that specifically targeted the Jewish market. It was created for any business interested in cultivating the Jewish trade, and Calvert Distillers co-opted it for use by its salesmen and distribution to the liquor store owners they called upon so that both could more effectively service their customers with a little schmear of Yiddish to grease the ethnic gears and help all concerned put a little extra gelt (money) in their pockets and mach a leben (make a living). It’s hands across the Old and New Testaments, brotherhood with a dollar sign.

He then goes on to relate the significance of this fun little pamphlet to the history of the Prohibition-era, and post-Prohibition, liquor business.  During the 1920′s, distillery inventories were warehoused and distributed through the few exemptions to the Volstead Act (which included, among a few other things, sacramental wine.  Kiddush, anyone?).

The original owners of these warehoused goods were issued government receipts and a lively trade developed for brokering the receipts which were sold by the original owners to raise cash, and then brokered for resale. Control the receipts, and you controlled the legal flow of booze in the U.S. The brokers and buyers of the receipts were, to a man, Jews.

Later, when the Volstead Act was repealed, distilleries needed significant capital to resume production.  Translation: these guys needed sugar daddies to meet the country’s pent-up demand for alcohol.  What a great business opportunity!  The result?

By the mid-1930s, Jews controlled the distilled spirits industry in the U.S., completely responsible for its finance, sales and marketing.

By the 1950′s (when this pamphlet was published), the industry was still run by Jews, but non-Jews were starting to enter the business in droves.  Clearly, at that time, knowing a little bit of Yiddish couldn’t hurt your career.

A fun, fascinating peice of Jewish history, to be sure.  This article is also a brief lesson in the value of ephemera:

Thus, this little booklet can serve as the cornerstone to a collection that can grow in many interesting directions. A far-sighted dealer could build a collection of American liquor business-related ephemera, perhaps with the Jewish slant and form a collection more valuable as a whole than in its parts and sell to a university, a Jewish or a liquor industry trade organization. An individual could do the same and gain much personal nachas (joy), something to really kvell (beam with immense, swollen pride) over having amassed a collection of material that has gotten little attention and, having done so, brought to light a slice of our cultural history and heritage heretofore passed over.

History isn’t only learned from books, folks.  You can read the whole, unabridged, article here.

-Naomi