Ecorse was one of the last holdouts of the old French families in Detroit, sometimes derogatorily called the “Muskrat French.” The larger-than-life rumrunner “Muskrat Laframboise” built himself a smuggling empire of sorts, with a base on Fighting Island and a crew of men to help him bring booze by the boatload across the river.

LaFramboise narrowly avoided countless scrapes, including at least two falls through the river ice, an assassination attempt at his home by rival rumrunners, and a gunshot from a federal Prohibition agent—who was quickly sacked—as he raced across the river in a friend’s boat on Canadian waters. Ecorse’s well-organized smugglers moved booze by boat, car and bike over the ice, and even via airplane; ten Ecorse men were indicted in a wide-reaching 1930 smuggling case.

The legend of the infamous Purple Gang looms large in Detroit folk history. If rumors are to be believed, every bar in Detroit that sports a tunnel (sewage or otherwise), or looks vaguely older than 40 years, once hosted the Purple Gang for wild parties and bootlegging exploits.

The fact of the matter is, the Purple Gang made most of their profits exploiting smaller fish through kidnapping, extortion, and bombing rivals. These Jewish Orthodox gangsters were, in the words of a rival gangster, “a lot of huckster robbers and petty criminals” and “kids who would hide under a bed” if faced with real criminal activity.

But Tommy’s is the real deal. A 2012 Wayne State archaeological dig unearthed hard evidence of a secret mahogany-lined gambling den in the nondescript bar’s basement. Photo evidence further suggests both a secret tunnel from the street and proof that the Purples used the space as a sanctuary and possibly a smuggling holdover, since the river is so close.

The Purples weren’t the only gang in town. Chester “Chet” LaMare’s East Side Gang had its headquarters in the swanky Venice Club on notoriously wild Hamtramck’s main drag. The original footprint of the Venice Café can be discovered by looking at the three-gabled roofline above Fat Salmon and the Euro Mini Mart.  

Hamtramck had the (dis)honor of sending two mayors to prison during Prohibition. One reporter called Joseph Campau Avenue “Hamtramck’s highway of iniquity,” and noted that the Venice in particular had the “reputation of unrestrained debauch that has made it the rendezvous of the largest and merriest of the cosmopolitan throngs that congregate in Hamtramck to forget care in a saturnalia of wine, women, and song.”

A pretty inglorious reputation for what is now a nondescript convenience store. 

Across from the Sunoco on Jefferson and Van Dyke, a white mansion hulks behind a fence as cars zip past, unaware of the house’s history.

For less than two short but raucous years, the Aniwa Club was the place to see and be seen for east side elites and high stakes gamblers. Drawers featuring hidden compartments for booze storage, closets that hid entrances to exclusive gambling parlors, and a tropical-themed jazz orchestra made the Aniwa a bustling speakeasy from 1929-1931. 

The Wertheimer brothers, proprietors of the club, didn’t stick around too long. The building housed restaurants on and off over the next 50 years, but was derelict and in danger of demolition until a recent $22 million redevelopment deal saved the property. If all goes according to plan, six lucky residents will be able to say they live in a former speakeasy. 

By the beginning of the Great Depression, rumrunners were increasingly wily and more than a bit wreckless. Local and federal crackdowns made for desperate measures. 

In the days before Christmas 1931, agents discovered a remarkable scheme. For months, federal and state Prohibition enforcers had been desperately trying to figure out exactly how rumrunners managed to smuggle booze across from Canada, despite stringent patrols by customs agents and border patrol.

Rumrunners cobbled together a motor-driven windlass which was used to drag a torpedo-like container all along the river bed from Canadian Peche Island, just a few thousand feet directly across the river. The ingenious device was designed to drop its load at the first sign of tampering with the chain along the surface.

When agents dragged the chain to its origin at the foot of Alter Road in Detroit, there was no one in residence at the house there—or at any house on the block. 

Blossom Heath started its life in 1911 as the Kramerhof Roadhouse, an inn catering to holiday-makers on East Jefferson just off the interurban railway. In 1920, Al Wertheimer—brother, coincidentally, of Mert Wertheimer, owner of the Aniwa Club—bought the place and renamed it Blossom Heath.

Under Wertheimer, the building sported two lavish Arabian-themed wings and a nonstop party. Once Prohibition ended, the building slipped into decline and nearly rotted away before the village of St. Clair Shores purchased it. Today it serves as one of the area’s best-known banquet halls.