Canajoharie’s cool factor just increased tenfold. A couple there has found a secret stash of Prohibition-era booze hidden in the walls and under the floors of their new house.
Last year, Nick Drummond and his partner Patrick Bakker moved from Baltimore to Upstate New York, where they bought an old home last month in Ames, NY, part of the town of Canajoharie. “We had always admired the home driving by and couldn’t resist taking a peek (sic) inside,” said Drummond. “It was in a village, yet in its own little world, perched up on a hill with incredible views of the valley.” The couple were told that the house had been owned by an heirless German baron, who had become a bootlegger during Prohibition but thought nothing of it.
That is, until one day, when they were repairing the trim of the house, along the side of their mudroom, and a paper-and-straw-filled package fell out on the lawn. Inside the package was a bottle of whiskey dating back to 1923. Just the side of the house alone turned up 46 bottles.
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But that wasn’t all. When doing demo inside the house, the couple found a hidden compartment in the floor. There were two compartments, actually, and after investigating them, they found yet more whiskey bottles under the floorboards. In all, the couple has found 66 bottles, 13 of which are full, as well as a few others that are half full. (They’ve since discovered even more.) The full bottles are reportedly worth $1,000 each.
You can find a full run-through of the couples’ story, along with whiskey bottle unwrapping videos and images of the stash on their @bootleggerbungalow Instagram page.
Drummond works as an architect in Cooperstown, while Bakker runs a floral design business, which also has a retail store in nearby Sharon Springs.
