Non-Taxpaid Whiskey Found in Liddell Lawson's Warehouse, Aug. 18, 1960

Warehouse Operator Draws Heavy Fine

Liddell Lawson, negro farmer of the Liddell section of western Lenoir County, drew the heaviest fine every imposed by Recorder Emmett Wooten last Friday when he was found guilty of having in his smokehouse 204 jars of non-taxpaid whiskey.

ABC officers who raided the “warehouse” said that Lawson was merely a pawn of large white bootleggers in Duplin County, who were using his smokehouse as a “warehouse” for their “wares.”

Duplin Countian with a handful of $100 bills paid the fine for Lawson, and commented that they were lucky to get off so light.

From the front page of the Jones County Journal, Trenton, N.C., Thursday, Aug. 18, 1960. Prohibition was long over but bootleggers still existed in 1960. North Carolinians had learned to make their own moonshine, and selling it without having paid taxes was profitable.