Harry Bronfman had enlarged the hotel in 1912 to twice the size of the original. As we can see from this photo, on the façade, he had painted his name beside the hotel name in large bold letters showing that he was proud of it and obviously was planning a permanent stay. Prohibition in Saskatchewan in 1915 caused hotel owners to seek other ways to increase their income. Harry built the City Garage on Broadway just across the lane from the hotel, and also by 1918 he had erected buildings on both sides of Third Avenue South. He had torn down the Royal Hotel on the corner of Second Avenue South and Livingstone with intentions to build a more elaborate building. He was the owner of the Canada Pure Drug Company situated next to the hotel, furnishing legal liquor to Drug Stores, and outside the province and obviously he had done very well financially. When it comes to how he conducted the illegal trade, one can consider the idea that tunnels existed, but also the fact that Harry had a variety of properties all in the same vicinity and therefore he had a lot of choices to hide packaged booze for the illegal markets inside the province. He also had his own vehicles at his disposal and the CPR freight shed was just across the street. So, did he need tunnels to hide booze? If we could uncover evidence of their existence, Yorkton would really come into the limelight. However, in the absence of hard evidence of tunnels, Yorkton has enough of a true story about Harry Bronfman, and his brother Sam joining him here and their entrance into the liquor market. Then, there is the story of their establishing warehouses along the international borders of Montana and North Dakota. Added to it, the woodland region around Yorkton also has colourful Prohibition true stories and folklore. Establishing an Interpretive Centre to portray our local, regional and provincial story could be considered.
Contact Terri Lefebvre Prince,
Heritage Researcher,
City of Yorkton Archives,
Box 400, 37 Third Avenue North
Yorkton, Sask. S3N 2W3
306-786-1722
[email protected]
