‘Sea of Beer in Her Saloon’

Mrs. Mary Koerner received quite a surprise when she entered her Highlandtown saloon one late March morning in 1911.

‘…[S]he was greeted with a veritable ocean of beer flowing over the floor. Floating on it were cigars, some whole, some stumps and some that were ‘entirely too young to be left to drown,’” reported The Baltimore Sun. “Cheese and crackers as well as ham figured in the ‘ghastly’ sight.”

Her saloon, near Fifth street in Highlandtown, wasn’t the only business visited by robbers. Grocer Max Berman went to the Canton Police Station to report that cheese, crackers and $9 were stolen from his store on Eastern Avenue and Eighth Street, while grocer Joseph Luette told police that hams had been stolen from his cellar at 100 Highland Avenue. And Orangeville Poultry Farm manager John Heltchue discovered a rooster and some hens had been stolen.

It seems as though some folks had quite a party at the expense of these establishments.

At least they had the decency to bring their own cigars.

Source: The Baltimore Sun, March 29, 1911