moonshine tankers

i read the article about call, johnson and ashley, old moonshine runners in an old article in hotrod mag. they had a fleet of 40 ford and a 60 chrysler and 426 hemi 66 coronet. when the hell did they stop runnin moonshine, after all, the first few nascar tracks opened in the 40's didnt they? (dont know much about nascar)

does anyone have old or new pictures of tanker cars? i always thought about a hot rodded engine in a 50s car that looks stock and no hubcaps, and adding a large tank under a "hollowed out" fake rear seat. even though im from nc i still dont know much about them, but i always loved how they could blast down hills leaving the cops behind.

 

Didn't know that they stopped. My Grandfather was from the mountains of Virginia. and he recently moved back up here to NY and he brought some of the good stuff with him.

 

They stopped ???? When da hell did that happen ??. FUCK..... we didn't get the memo down here.... Dammit.....now Gramps is gotta roundup Merle and Buck and tell 'em to stop.

 

They haven't stopped, still running it around here...

 

still flows here as well .. looks like lots of folks didnt get the memo!

 

Heck my still is a old pressure cooker with the rubber plug removed and a copper tubing with a dough seal. cook the mash in the kitchen stove with a fan blowing over the coils. keep the temt below 212 and strain the 190 proof that comes out through a charcoal filter. It would thke too much work to make enough to fill a tank as big as a back seat OldWolf

 

here is an article about Moonshine Cars w/ Junior Johnson http://www.hotrod.com/thehistoryof/113_0510_moonshine_runners_cars_history/moonshine.html

 

have mercey! i bet your kitchen smells bitchin in the process!

BTW isnt a tanker considered a precurser?? about the same as a meth lab? i seem to remember my grandaddy speakin about going to the pen over a tanker and the Revs charged him for what the tanks "could" hold as opposed to what the tanks actually had in them , tax wise of course and thats why they started transporting
in jugs so if caught they could only be charged by the actual gallon..

 

.... & unless your were delivering HUGE quantities to a HUGE buyer the jugs were more convenient. Not many were set up to accept a tank full then turn around & jug it for sale.

JH

 

Junior Johnson ran shine while he was racing. He says he made more money running shine. And. The fastest car he ever drove was a shine car.

 

Moonshine was a way of life for my dads family. i remember seeing the stills in the back woods when i would go see my great grandparents. my uncle jimmy would be sitting there watching and making sure the fire was still going and the shine flowing! he only did small batches as he was getting up in his years and only did it for his friends and family. when he was running it he was driving a 51 Ford tudor with a flathead that my grandfather would tune(he raced dirt cars here locally and all were flattie powered). that car is still with us my dad has restored it to bone stock showroom original and lives its life in our garage now.

 

Since the statue of limitations (or whatever they call it) has run out, I will relate what I know as fact. Back in the 60's and early 70's I was a driver in the North Georgia mountains. There wasn't much going on as this was the end of most of the moonshining, however there were still a lot of oldtimers in the larger metro area's such as Atlanta and the Athens area that actually preferred 'shine over government whiskey. No tankers by this time, all the shine was in quart glass jars or plastic gallon jugs. I never made any 'shine, but I did sell sugar in 50 and 100 lb bags to the guys who did and I would drive their loads into the metro areas. Generally all it took was a plain looking car with a BIG trunk. By the time I was involved, you didn't really set up to outrun the law. Their radio network was setup good enough by then that it made that very hard. You just tried to have a car that just blended in with everything else on the road. Mostly I drove the cars supplied to me. The one that I remember was a mid 60's bottom line Chrylser, beige color with withwall tires and regular hubcaps. I never opened the hood; it sounded like it was probably a 413 or 440. The rear springs were built up to hold the extra weight. I would drive it to a particular restaurant in Atlanta or movie theatre in Athens and go in and have a meal or see a movie. And then I would simply come out and go home. $100 a trip, which was a lot of money in 1968. I never had the keys to the trunk! Never even thought of what I would do if I had a flat tire. The only time I met anyone on the receiving end was one night when I drove my own car. I had a 65 Impala SS convertible. It had air bags in the rear springs. I went to a particular restaurant and a guy just happened to come and sit in my booth. Nice looking businessman looking type. I handed him the keys and he was back in about 30 minutes. We chatted for a few minutes and he left. He had even let enough air out of the air bags to level out the car for me before he brought it back!

Sorry for being so long winded. I've never seen a 'tanker' car. The 'shiners' that I know who ran back in the 50's even packed it in quart glass jars. It must have been prior to that. Just don't ask me how I paid for my wife's engagement ring!

 

Still a BIG business! Plastic gallon jugs are the new "tanks" . Not a lot of outrunning the law today. Outsmarting them is generally easier.

 

Plus........Your gonna play hell tryin' to git a pitchure of ANY kind of shine car. If'n you did get (un)lucky enuff to run across one....at the first sign of a camera you would be on the recievin' end of a shotgun suppository .

 

Hey you guys thanks for the first hand stories,this is too KOOL......kinda reminds me of some "stories" I heard in the 70s

 

Good thread, thanks for the stories!

 

Heck, CMT last year or the year before ran a special on modern-day moonshiners. It still goes on. Maybe not to the level it did years ago, but for some folks it's like a family tradition.

 

hahahah guys, i didnt mean the moonshine, but the cars, and running it through the hills, i mean, yeah you can throw some jars in your trunk and move em but i meant actually getting chased and making your sedan a tanker with the tank and all....i just cant see a 2004 lincoln walking away from three cop cars and a helicoptor just to sell it in town hahah

 

damnit, i shouldnt have started this thread hahaha

 

wow i take that back, i posted the last comment before finishing reading the thread, so i was wrong, i watch too many movies then. so big engine, heavy springs, and a big trunk was it huh.... i hate movies that lie hahahah


thanks alot twotoejoe, that was cool as hell, really, i enjoyed reading that, hell, you can type as much as you want about old stories, im sure all of us love hearing them. any pictures of those two cars? my 65 catalina would make a great runner, she will be bone stock minus the engine and rear susp. ill even run skirts and caps. i always really liked the 54 lincoln capri thats in that new moonshinehighway movie, it was loud, fast low and a roll cage and no caps, just looked badass.

 

If you are seriously interested,the best place to see some re-created and probably real runner's cars is in Dawsonville in October.
http://www.motorsportamerica.com/banners/moonshine.html

 

Listen to Copperhead Road by Steve Earl "Grandaddy ran whiskey in a big black Dodge him and my uncle tore that engine down, I can still remember that rumblin sound"... Great song

 

Some haven't stopped- when I flew from my hometown airport to Chicago two years ago (4 seater Cessna), the trip took us over the forests around the Lake Lanier area. The pilot was telling us about the 'shiners that would take shots at the plane if they flew too low- I thrust the pilot well enough to know that he was telling the truth.

 

When I was a teenager in NC, I bought a floorpan out of a '60 Plymouth that had been a moonshine tanker. The back seat was gone entirely and was replaced with a big, flat tank.

 

Now vans are used. I have never saw a car with a tank. Too hard to make or install. You had to use stainless or glass or the product would be take on the taste of the contaner. Although some folks used the 5 gal container of coke a cola concertrate that was furnished to the fountain trade. The best moonshine I ever saw was made by Marvin "Popcorn" Sutton.. The son of little mitch sutton. The best Manager and owner of a fleet of cars and distribution network was or is Mr Raymond Parks of Atlanta Ga. The last car I was involved with was a 65 Chevrolet Impala large trunk . It blended in at the time 1975. Equiped with air shocks, Had a engine that was powerful enough to move the car without much strain. 100 dollars for a afternoon drive not bad money.... Some time we would haul store bought or bonded name brand wiskey to the dry countys......Bobby...

 

moonshining is still done to this day..
I have some 200 proof White Lighting in my pantry to prove it..brought some of it to Michigans BilletProof..but no takers..
thats fine..more for me..came out of Tenn.
but if i told you where exactly,, i'd have ta kill ya

 

In Thunder Road Mitchums car was a tanker.....

 

haven't you watched the original dukes of hazard
uncle jesse was a runner
tk

 

got a touch (for medicinal purposes only) stashed in my shop. good thread , well i need to go take my medicine

 

"Young Sap, take a little shot and put in a small glass, light on fire, if the flame is blue it is safe to drink." Uncle Jim- Ohio & WV