Martin went to work as a salesman, and then stayed on. When Prohibition was repealed in 1933, Martin was vice president. By the late 1930's, with World War II impending in Europe, threatening to cut off liquor imports here, Martin was the president of Heublein, which was still a small company.

Then came Smirnoff.

Martin had learned that in the town of Bethel, about 50 miles from Hartford, a man named Rudolph Kunett was manufacturing vodka on a very small basis. Kunett had fled Russia during the revolution there two decades before. He brought to Connecticut a great quantity of rubles and a patent to make Smirnoff, the only vodka served at the Imperial Russian Court. Unfortunately, the rubles were worthless on the world market and the Imperial Russian Court did not provide much cachet because it no longer existed.

Nevertheless, Kunett had set up a small vodka plant in Bethel and was trying to build an American market. He was enjoying a notable lack of success. Americans did not drink vodka. Most had never even heard of it. Martin offered Kunett a deal. He would buy Kunett's equipment for $14,000, give him a job and a royalty of 5 percent on each bottle of Smirnoff sold for 10 years. Kunett took the offer and Martin set out to see if he could sell Smirnoff, the vodka of the czars, in an age when there were no czars.

Smirnoff vodka is basically a mixture of pure grain alcohol and water filtered through charcoal. It requires no aging and production and sales started in Hartford in 1939 even before Heublein had any caps for the vodka bottles. Instead, caps labeled "whiskey" were used.

One of the first out-of-state sales was to a distributor in Columbia, S.C., who bought 10 cases. A short time later, the distributor ordered 50 more cases, then 500 cases. And Martin went to Columbia to check on the marketing phenomena. He later recalled, with more than a bit of delight, what he had found.

"We had a salesman down there and he had put up a great streamer: 'Smirnoff White Whiskey -- No Smell, No Taste,' " The Hartford Times quoted Martin as saying in a 1964 article. "It was strictly illegal, of course, but it was going great. People were mixing it with milk and orange juice and whatnot."

Martin visited Hollywood occasionally to see an actress, Jane Weeks, who would become his wife. They had a mutual friend, Jack Morgan, who ran a restaurant, the Cock-'n-Bull, and one day Martin and Morgan concocted a drink. It was made of Smirnoff vodka and ginger beer and served in a copper mug. They called it the "Moscow Mule."