East Grand Forks Brewery

The East Grand Forks Brewery was built in 1890. It was rebuilt two times after, once in 1891 and the building that stands today was built in 1907. It was one of 6 cold storage warehouses in east grand forks at this time. Small breweries would ship their beer to the larger warehouses allowing the sales to reach a bigger market.

In 1896 East Grand forks was known to be a hub for illegal gambling, prostitution and booze. This is how the East grand forks brewery became established. It was a shipping ground for smaller companies to get their liquor on the market. While North Dakota was founded as a dry state Minnestoa most definitely was not. Since East Grand Forks was right across the river they attracted a lot of attention from the Grand forks side, both negative and positive. This led to East grand forks being nicknamed by many as the wild East. At one point there were 48 saloons with most of them being supplied by liquor smugglers from Canada. From 1880-1915 the bulk of the city's revenue came from liquor, prostitution and gambling.

Prohibition did not change much for East Grand Forks until later. The police would overlook much of the liquor sales occurring because of the profound impact these sales had on the economy of East Grand Forks. If they had to bust someone the speakeasy owners would get together and literally draw straws to see who would give themselves and their businesses up. In 1915 the city voted to go "dry". Not that this would last but speakeasies turned into "soft drink parlors" and continued to sell alcohol just more undercover as they didn't not have most of the police force on their side at this point.

This all came to an end when a commissioner from North Dakota got sick of illegal liquor being brought from East Grand Forks into Grand Forks. He requested for the East Grand Forks brewery to be searched. After this search $40,000 worth of alcohol was found and dumped into the red river. The brewery was shut down and its owner sent to prison. Without the main storage and shipping unit for the liquor in East Grand Forks many of the speakeasys and soft drink parlors closed or moved to find better business. This signaled an end of an era for the East Grand Forks area. However, some people still may refer to the East side and the Wild East or the wrong side of the tracks, because of the reputation they created in the late 1800s and early 1900s.

Rolczynski, John. When Prohibition Reigned by Law in the Grand Forks, North Dakota- East Grand Forks, Minnesota, Area : Local and National Aspects of That 'Noble Experiment'. J. Rolczynski, 1992. 

Sylvester, Stephen G. A Meeting of the Reds : East Grand Forks, 1887-1987. [East Grand Forks Centennial Committee 1987, Centennial Book Committee], 1988. 

Vonasek, Janelle. “The Wild East: East Grand Forks' History of High Times across the River.” Grand Forks Herald, Grand Forks Herald, 17 May 2019, https://www.grandforksherald.com/newsmd/the-wild-east-east-grand-forks-history-of-high-times-across-the-river.