The Brewery and Distillery of E.R. Hantzsch

OK, lets start off with another photo of the fabulous E.R. Hantzsch pottery beer...

This one still has the wire bale attached.  It held in a cork and was presumably sealed at Hantzsch's brewery.  But where was that?  If you slogged through my recent entry on Hantzsch you can be forgiven for a bit of confusion.  Welcome to the world of local history research!  Street names change, spellings mutate, buildings burn down and are replaced, sometimes wrong info is put out as accurate.

But a couple of articles from the Eau Claire Leader in 1932 cast a bit of light onto matters.  The interest in whiskey and beer was not doubt enhanced by the presence of Prohibition, although to be fair in Wisconsin the Volsteadt Act was more an abstract concept than the Law of the Land. Perhaps the best way to tell the tale is to quote the articles, with photos, maps and annotations as needed.  First from May 4th, 1932.

SECRET BASEMENT, TUNNEL ARE DISCOVERED IN RUINS OF OLD BREWERY BUILDING.

May Have Housed Secret Still in Old Days.

"In the final operations incident to tearing down Eau Claire's first brewery, the old Edward R. Hantzsch building at 413 South River Street, built during or about the time of the Civil War, workmen Monday uncovered a secret basement, 20 feet long and about 6 feet wide, at the north end of the building."

Here's the site today.  

As the name implies, River Street which is seen above, fronts on the river.  So the building in question faced this way.  As only made sense in the day before railroads...the river was the main transportation artery.  A map of the site from 1883, just a few years after the Hantzsch enterprise vanished.  The text is upside down here as I have rotated it so that you are looking the same direction as the photo.

The building being referred to is in the center of the block.  The little alley you see in the photo seems to be present in this view as well.  No cellar on the north end of the building but there is a well marked as one would expect.

And here's an 1897 view with more detail.  This time I have not rotated it.  You can see the "alley" clearly...right where the number 4 sits.  Note that the "brewery" is listed as vacant and is made of stone.  The back of the alley ends at 410 South Barstow.  Next door is 412, a Sausage Factory at the time this map was made.

To resume parts of the 1932 narrative:

(The secret basement) "..was separated from the main basement by a solid 16-inch stone wall, with no opening from one end to the other."..."Although there was no opening or passageway between the basement proper and this secret chamber, through the partition wall, there was an opening at the east end of the chamber leading to a secret tunnel or passageway which turned south outside the east wall, following that wall south to a point under the old wagon entrance to the brewery building."

This is a bit hard to follow, making it unclear whether the "wagon entrance" was at current ground level with the tunnel under it or perhaps the wagon entrance was below current street level.  The basement was not explored, just filled in with rubble.

The connection between the Hantzsch brewery and distillery is discussed in this article:

"...Hantzsch operated a distillery in the building a few yards east of the brewery building, which abuts on the George Platner building which fronts on 412 South Barstow Street.  The old distillery, which operated under government license, is being remodeled and refitted as a used car exchange."

Both of the plat maps above show a substantial building at 412 Barstow, one that is unlikely to be of Civil War vintage.  But there is that odd partition in the middle of it, so perhaps the allusion to it "abutting" the building at 412 means that it was the back half of it.   Here's 412 South Barstow today.

  

Its a movie theater turned urban church.  The building to the right can be seen at the back of the "alley".  There should be some of the early E.R. Hantzsch building in there somewhere but given the space needs of a theater it could not be much above ground level.

During the renovations at 412 Barstow workers are said to have found lots of lead pipes.  There was speculation of an underground, off the books still, but again the space was not explored and a cement floor was poured over it.

An earlier article on April 30th 1932 gave a few  more details.

- Both the brewery and distillery buildings were owned by a Ross L. Waser who ran a used car exchange.

-The second story of the distillery (fronting on Barstow) had been a small dance hall associated with the enterprise.  Mentions of social events at "Hantzsch's Hall" appear in the 1870's newspapers.  This second story was removed and a roof put on what would become the office of the Waser business.  Note that the modern building is decidedly not a one story affair.  

- The buildings were reported to be 70 years old but in good condition.  The demolition work was quite difficult.

The Hollywood Theater opened for business in 1947 after what is described as a two year building process....prolonged due to war time shortages of materials.

On the whole I'd give the local reporters good marks for their detective work.  It is likely that the building facing River Street was the original part of the complex and from contemporary mentions it can be dated to 1866.  Not Civil War era but close.  Hantzsch was probably cooking up whiskey, vinegar and maybe beer before that, perhaps in a smaller facility closer to his tavern some three blocks north.  In general brewing and distilling are not ideal neighbors to an eating and drinking establishment. There tends to be a degree of odor and considerable fire risk.  Oh, and there was at least one brewery in Eau Claire in the late 1850's, clearly predating Hantzsch.

I've not been inside the Hollywood Theater.  It may have been hanging on when I moved to the area in 1985 but not for long after.  And as to its more recent religious incarnation my church going preferences are more along sedate Lutheran lines.  Besides, were I sitting there on a Sunday morning it would be impossible for me not to look towards the pulpit up front and visualize a network of whiskey pipes, secret basements and fantastic pottery beer bottles directly underneath!