The Diamond Liquor Co. before Prohibition; Upper-Exterior, Lower-Interior. -- ESPLANADE PHOTO
Well over 100 years ago, the Diamond Liquor Co. was a thriving business on North Railway Street. The Diamond was a popular and successful company which carried a vast selection of spirits including Canadian and imported liquors, French wine, cognac and champagne, ales, and beer, and at Christmas time, Guinness stout imported from Ireland.
Fueled by the emergence of the temperance movement, on July 1, 1916, not only the Diamond liquor store, but every other liquor outlet in Medicine Hat closed its doors. This was the day the prohibition bill came into effect in Alberta.
The Diamond’s proprietor, J.G. Endersby began as a partner in the Diamond liquor store and became the sole owner in 1910. Not only did Jack Endersby lose his business, his career as a liquor vendor was also over. Local liquor vendors were given 11 month’s notice to dispose of their inventory and wind down their businesses. Their fate had been predetermined on July 29, 1915.
On that date, a provincial plebiscite had been passed approving the Liquor Act which abolished all hotel, club, and wholesale licenses in the province and prohibited the sale of intoxicating liquors except for medicinal, scientific and sacramental purposes, and for those purposes the sale would be handled under government control. Newspaper headlines reported the event as a “triumph” for Albertans. The Lethbridge Herald went as far as to say, “there can be no question now that the province, county and city want the booze business wiped out.”
The prohibition era in Alberta ended on November 5, 1923, the result of a province wide plebiscite. However, the Diamond Liquor Co. never reopened.
Because prohibition was deemed unsuccessful, Alberta now introduced government-controlled liquor sales to regulate access to liquor. In Medicine Hat, our first Alberta Liquor Control Board outlet was set up in the same neighbourhood as Endersby’s former liquor store. Located on North Railway Street a block south of the former Diamond Liquor Co., the new ALCB store operated out of what is today the Mainliner Pub. Former City Clerk, Alderman, and World War I veteran, Captain Herbert Baker was our first ALCB vendor.
A decade later the Diamond Liquor Co. building was demolished and replaced. Today the old site is occupied by Douglas Meats and SafeLink.
Sally Sehn is a past Member of the Heritage Resources Committee, City of Medicine Hat
