Robert Allen

Detroit Free Press

The Canadian Club building across the Detroit River, where Al Capone's bootleggers and Detroit's Purple Gang made Prohibition-era deals, is ending its public tours.

Illicit booze flowed from the distillery into countless speakeasies and homes in Detroit, Chicago and beyond during the national alcohol ban from 1920 to 1933. Its founder, Hiram Walker, was a prolific entrepreneur who rubbed shoulders with Henry Ford and Thomas Edison.

For $12, you can visit the original Canadian Club headquarters, the Albert Kahn-designed Canadian Club Heritage Centre built in 1894 in Windsor, and learn the stories and taste samples of the liquors. But not after March 31.

Beam Suntory, the Illinois-based beverage corporation that now owns the Canadian Club brand, is "refocusing our investments" and shutting down the tours, according to a statement. But opposition is growing.

"Not if I can help it," Windsor Mayor Drew Dilkens said Feb. 9 on Facebook, posting a link to a Windsor Star article about the planned closure. Separately, a "Save the Canadian Club Centre" Facebook page that started Friday had amassed more than 1,200 likes by Wednesday.

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"I'm pretty sure that most Detroiters don't know that Hiram Walker was a Detroiter, was an American," said Joel Stone, senior curator with the Detroit Historical Society. "He was one of Detroit's many tycoons at that time."

While living in Detroit, Walker in 1858 founded Hiram Walker and Sons distillery in Windsor. Land was cheaper there, and a new Michigan law limiting alcohol to medicinal purposes had created uncertainty, according to his biography from the University of Toronto. The early signs of Prohibition were already taking shape.

"Walker was kind of aware of that, and he decided that if he was going to build a distillery, he was going to do it across the river," Stone said.

Walker became wealthy from his endeavors. Beam Suntory rents the Heritage Centre building and owns the "brand assets inside," including a "vast collection of art pieces and artifacts," according to the statement. It says the company plans to continue using those items to promote the brand's history and support the Windsor community.

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"We assure you that our commitment to the Windsor community is just as strong as ever — we are just refocusing our investments to better cultivate the brand both locally and around the world," according to the statement.

The Windsor Star reports that Dilkens met Monday with Beam Suntory executives in Chicago, and that he felt hopeful afterward. It also reported that French beverage company Pernod Ricard owns the building and had just learned of Beam Suntory's announcement would be reviewing the situation.

Dilkens last year declared July 4, 2016, as Hiram Walker Day, commemorating the Canadian Club founder's 200th birthday. CBC News reported in September that the city is putting $400,000 toward a bronze statue of Walker.

Shane Potvin of Windsor said he started the "Save the Canadian Club Centre" Facebook page. He's a partner at nearby Tango Creative Group and has been to the building for tours and events.

"When it comes to culture and heritage in our city, the rum-running and Prohibition is ingrained, kind of, in our fabric," he said, adding that the building "really represents a big part" of that.

He said there has been lots of positive response to the page. While Beam Suntory has indicated plans to keep the historic art and artifacts local, he said, it would "be a shame even if they moved" them, seeing how Walker's office has been kept intact.

"It's shocking to think that there's any other option," Potvin said.

Beam Suntory did confirm that it will continue to produce Canadian Club whiskey at the Windsor distillery.

Marty Gervais, a resident writing professional at the University of Windsor who wrote "The Rumrunners: A Prohibition Scrapbook," said many people who made money during Prohibition visited the then-Canadian Club headquarters now known as the Heritage Centre.

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It's "one of the most beautiful historic buildings in Windsor," with an Italian Renaissance-style exterior, and interior that includes mahogany and walnut paneling, with wood carvings and marble features, he said.

"The craftsmanship of the place is unbelievable — it's quite lovely," Gervais said. "The public should have access to it. And it's something that we should be proud of."

About 80% of all liquor that went from Canada into the U.S. went through Windsor and Detroit. And of that amount, about 75% to 80% would've been from the Canadian Club's operations, he said.

On the tour, a guide takes visitors through the building's rooms, describing the company's history as well as how liquor was sneaked across the river into Detroit. It's more focused on the area's history, and the Walker story, than the distilling process. Through TripAdvisor, the tour has about a 4.5 out of 5 rating and 231 reviews. It's rated No. 3 of 72 things to do in Windsor.

"It's definitely a bit of an unheard-of gem," Potvin said. "A lot of people, Windsorites, have never been through that building. ... It's one of the coolest things."

Stone said it's "really disappointing" to hear of the tours ending, though he hadn't been on one himself.

"I know following 9/11, the number of Detroiters going to Windsor for that kind of thing really fell off," he said, referring to the enhanced security measures at the international border.

He said tours in general were a bigger part of the local tourism business, with the Stroh Brewery and Vernors ginger ale plant among the destinations. Now, "that kind of stuff is going away," Stone said.

Walker moved to Windsor for about five years as he developed the distilling business and others, such as grain milling and vinegar manufacture. In the decades that followed, the business and others grew substantially, including during the years of U.S. alcohol prohibition.

The success of his businesses led to Walkerville, a town where Walker built homes and a church, paid for police and fire protection and laid water piping. By the early 1880s, about 600 people lived in the "typical company town ruled over by a benevolent founder and his sons and relatives," according to the biography.

He then returned to Detroit for the rest of his life before he died in 1899. Today, you can visit his grave at Elmwood Cemetery on Detroit's east side, near Belle Isle.

Evidence of Walker's influence can still be seen in the area. The Garden Court Condominiums were a 1915 project Hiram Walker's son, J. Harrington Walker, undertook with Albert Kahn — possibly so the distiller could keep an eye on river traffic near the family business, according to the condo website.

Hiram Walker created a ferry service to get from Detroit to Windsor, and a Walker-family home was built at the intersection of Jos. Campau and Jefferson, near the ferry dock. But it was torn down, said William Worden, retired director of Historic Designations for the City of Detroit.

Was the ferry service used for smuggling Prohibition-era booze? Not likely. Worden said it was usually guarded, and his own mother was arrested when she tried to sneak a bottle of champagne through in her coat.

He said there's also a home on 1441 Burns, where Walker's grandson, Hiram H. Walker II, lived. He was, at one time, married to a member of the Stroh family.

Beam Suntory said in its statement that while the tours will stop after March, scheduled weddings will be allowed to continue through Dec. 31.

For information on taking at tour, go to the Windsor Essex Pelee Island Tourism website, http://visitwindsoressex.com/canadian-club-brand-centre-2/.

Spirits of Detroit columnist Robert Allen covers craft alcohol for the Free Press. He can be reached at rallen@freepress.com or on Untappd, raDetroit; Twitter @rallenMI, Facebook robertallen.news, and Periscope rallenMI