1923-09-17-sr-p8-c1-booze-woe-to-wheat-queen
September 17, 1923 Spokesman-Review Page 8 Column 1:
IN MID-WASHINGTON
BOOZE IS WOE TO “WHEAT QUEEN”
Now She Is Alluded To as “Moonshine Queen of Lincoln County.”
RUM RAID ROILS HER
She Uses Language of Great Open Spaces in Berating Officers Who Arrested Her.
DAVENPORT, Wash,, Sept. 16.—Once known as “the wheat queen of the Big Bend,” where she owned more wheat land and harvested more golden grain than any woman in the northwest, Mrs, Josephine Ditmar Is now being alluded to as the “moonshine queen of Lincoln county.” The fatter title was fixed upon her after Lincoln county officers raided the Ditmar farm, southeast of Davenport, Thursday night, and captured one of the largest stills ever found in the county, as well as five barrels of mash and a quantity of moonshine liquor.
Mrs. Ditmar came to Lincoln county in the early ‘80s and shortly afterward was married to William Ditmar, prominent wheat grower. Later she divorced Ditmar and succeeded to most of the land which he owned. Farming was farming in those days, wheat growing was a, profitable industry, and every harvest of golden grain from the Ditmar wheat fields meant a harvest of dollars for Mrs. Josephine Ditmar. She acquired more and more land, until she was noted as the woman owning the most land of any of her sex In the northwest, and received her title of “the wheat queen of the Big Bend.”
Lost Much of Her Land.
Then came troubles. The war began. Land prices wore deflated, and little by little the great wheat land holdings of Mrs. Ditmar dwindled away. The land on which she was living when Thursday's raid occurred has been in litigation recently and a receiver is handling it.
Thursday evening Deputy Sheriff C. V. Fisher, Prosecutor Roy C. Fox and W. J. Colville, Reardan marshal, swooped down on the Ditmar farm. The huge still, together with the mash, a quantity of charcoal, coils, cooling barrels and other moonshine paraphernalia, were located in the loft of a chicken house.
A gallon jug of moonshine whisky was found in the Ditmar farm home. r. Colville was left in charge of this jug, while the other officers began to search outside. Suddenly Mrs. Ditmar dashed into the room with a stove poker and smashed the jug.
“Who smashed that jug?” said Deputy Sheriff Fisher, when he returned to the house.
“That old cat there,” Colville is said to have replied, and then the battle was on.
Night in Jail Calms Her.
Mrs. Ditmar is a pioneer and a wheat grower, not a society bud, and her language is that of the great open spaces rather than of the drawing room.
She danced about Colville, threatening to strike the officer and berating him,
Later she and her son, Frank, were brought to the county jail here. After several hours' solitary confinement in a cell, Mrs. Ditmar calmed down. She was brought before Justice F. H. McDermont Friday on a charge of manufacturing liquor with intent to sell. She entered a plea of not guilty and politely asked that the justice postpone her trial until after harvest time. He granted her request, and the one-time “wheat queen of the Big Bend” was released under $1000 cash bond. She had §750 in cash when arrested and used this as part of her bond money.
