The Kansas City Craft Cocktail Tradition

Kansas City’s craft cocktail tradition runs from the city’s pre-Prohibition saloons and the wide-open drinking culture of the Pendergast era through a 21st-century revival of speakeasy-style bars and legal distilling. It connects a heritage of mail-order whiskey and machine-protected vice to a modern scene anchored by Manifesto, The Rieger, Swordfish Tom’s, and the revived J. Rieger & Co. and Tom’s Town distilleries.

Pendergast-era drinking culture and distilling heritage

Long before the modern cocktail revival, Kansas City was a drinking town. By the late nineteenth century the West Bottoms held one of the densest concentrations of saloons in the country. A single block-long stretch near the Union Depot and the Ninth Street cable car line was known as “the wettest block in the world,” with roughly twenty-five saloons and liquor retailers occupying nearly every storefront.¹ Its position on the Missouri-Kansas state line drew drinkers from both sides.

It was in this environment that Jacob Rieger founded J. Rieger & Co. in 1887, building it into what became one of the largest mail-order whiskey houses in the United States. The original distillery operated in the West Bottoms, near the Livestock Exchange Building, until federal Prohibition forced it to close in December 1919.²

Prohibition barely slowed Kansas City down. Under political boss Tom Pendergast, the city earned a reputation as America’s “wide-open town.” The machine-controlled police department and courts looked the other way, liquor kept flowing, and gambling and nightlife thrived.³ That permissive climate helped nurture the city’s signature contribution to American music, Kansas City jazz, which grew up alongside the clubs of the 18th and Vine district. The cocktail tradition and the jazz tradition share this same Prohibition-era root.

The craft cocktail revival

The modern revival began in the basement of the Rieger Hotel building at 1924 Main Street in the Crossroads, a space that had reportedly functioned as a speakeasy during Prohibition. There, bartender Ryan Maybee opened Manifesto, a reservation-driven, speakeasy-style cocktail bar that is widely credited as the first of its kind in the modern Kansas City scene.⁴ A year later Maybee opened The Rieger as a restaurant on the main floor of the same building.⁵

That partnership produced the scene’s defining link back to KC’s distilling past. On The Rieger’s opening night, Andy Rieger, the great-great-great-grandson of Jacob Rieger, came in to thank Maybee for honoring his family’s name. The two agreed to revive the family business, and in October 2014 they relaunched J. Rieger & Co. as the first legal distillery in Kansas City since Prohibition, working with master distillers Dave Pickerell and Tom Nichol. The revived company is based in the East Bottoms, a few miles from the original West Bottoms site.²⁵

The momentum continued through the 2010s. Tom’s Town Distilling Co., founded in 2015 by Steve Revare and David Epstein, became downtown’s first legal distillery since Prohibition and leaned explicitly into the city’s history, taking its name from Tom Pendergast and styling its Crossroads tasting room around Prohibition-era cocktails.⁶ In 2017, Swordfish Tom’s, an intimate underground bar focused on pre-Prohibition-style drinks, opened in the Crossroads.⁷ Westport’s cocktail-forward bars, including Julep, rounded out a scene that by the end of the decade spanned several neighborhoods.

Notable bars and distilleries

• Manifesto — Speakeasy-style cocktail bar in the basement of the Rieger Hotel building, 1924 Main Street, Crossroads. Founded by Ryan Maybee; widely regarded as the anchor of the modern KC scene.⁴
• The Rieger — Restaurant opened by Ryan Maybee on the main floor of the Rieger Hotel building, about a year after Manifesto.⁵
• J. Rieger & Co. — Distillery founded 1887 in the West Bottoms, closed 1919, and revived in October 2014 by Andy Rieger and Ryan Maybee; the first legal KC distillery since Prohibition, now in the East Bottoms. See j-rieger-and-co.²
• Tom’s Town Distilling Co. — Founded 2015 by Steve Revare and David Epstein; downtown’s first legal distillery since Prohibition, with a Prohibition-themed Crossroads tasting room. See toms-town-distilling-co.⁶
• Swordfish Tom’s — Underground Crossroads cocktail bar specializing in pre-Prohibition-style drinks; opened 2017.⁷
• Julep — Westport cocktail bar.

Cultural significance

Kansas City’s cocktail revival is unusual among American mid-sized cities in how tightly it ties present-day craft drinking back to a documented local history. The same buildings, the same family name (Rieger), and the same Pendergast-era mythology that defined KC drinking a century ago now anchor its marketing and its menus. The revival sits alongside the city’s broader craft-food and craft-beverage resurgence, complementing established producers such as Boulevard Brewing Co.

For the Crossroads and downtown in particular, the cocktail bars and distilleries have become part of the commercial-cultural identity of those districts, drawing visitors and reinforcing a revival narrative rooted in genuine local heritage rather than imported nostalgia.

Sources

Footnotes

1. Kansas City Magazine, “You can still get a drink at these notorious Prohibition-era Kansas City speakeasies” — on the West Bottoms “wettest block in the world.” https://kansascitymag.com/you-can-still-get-a-drink-at-these-notorious-prohibition-era-kansas-city-speakeasies-1/ ↩

2. J. Rieger & Co. company history and Wikipedia — founding (1887, West Bottoms), closure (December 1919), and October 2014 revival in the East Bottoms. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/J._Rieger_%26_Co. and https://www.jriegerco.com/history/about-us ↩ ↩² ↩³

3. Legends of America, “Pendergast Era of Kansas City, Missouri,” and Kansas City Public Library “The Pendergast Years” — KC as a “wide-open town” and jazz culture. https://www.legendsofamerica.com/pendergast-kansas-city/ and https://pendergastkc.org/about ↩

4. KSHB, “What’s old is new again: an inside look at Kansas City’s speakeasy revival,” and Anne Brockhoff, “Manifesto’s Reopening Captures Trends” — Manifesto in the Rieger Hotel basement; opening year reported variously as 2009 and 2011. https://www.kshb.com/news/local-news/whats-old-is-new-again-an-inside-look-at-kansas-citys-speakeasy-revival ↩ ↩²

5. KC Yesterday, “Reviving a Legacy: The Story of J. Rieger & Co.” — Maybee opens Manifesto, then The Rieger upstairs a year later; partnership with Andy Rieger leading to the 2014 distillery revival. https://kcyesterday.com/articles/reviving-a-legacy-the-story-of-j-rieger-co-and-kansas-citys-first-distillery-since-prohibition ↩ ↩² ↩³

6. Crossroads Arts District and Tom’s Town Distilling Co. “Our Story” — founded 2015 by Steve Revare and David Epstein; Pendergast namesake; Prohibition-themed tasting room. https://kccrossroads.org/explore-the-crossroads/toms-town-distilling-co-2/ and https://www.toms-town.com/our-story ↩ ↩²

7. Feast Magazine, “Swordfish Tom’s to Bring an Intimate Cocktail Experience to the Crossroads” — underground Crossroads bar, pre-Prohibition-style cocktails, opened 2017. https://m.feastmagazine.com/the-feed/kansas_city_news/article_98b5c186-e960-11e6-8517-c3a4091fe237.html ↩ ↩²