The Maryland rye whiskey once made on the banks of the Jones Falls was so valuable that the Melvale Distillery protected its booze with armed guards.

A gunfight broke out in June of 1923 as thieves tried to raid a warehouse with 200,000 gallons of whiskey, the newspapers reported. Years passed, times changed. Vinegar replaced whiskey in the vats. The distillery was still there, though, its cupola rising beside the Jones Falls Expressway at Cold Spring Lane. For how much longer?

Crews worked this week to demolish the buildings on the grounds. By Friday, gone was the north face of the Melvale Distillery, believed to have been the longest continually operating distillery in Maryland. No one’s saying if the historic building will be knocked down entirely, but city permits show it’s in the path of the wrecking ball.

“It would be a real loss to demolish the 1850 stone Melvale Distillery, perhaps the longest running maker of our state’s famous Maryland Rye Whiskey,” said Johns Hopkins, executive director of Baltimore Heritage, a nonprofit that works to save the city’s historic buildings. “Mills, stables, ironwork facilities, and all sorts of buildings of this age have found new uses in the Jones Falls Valley and the distillery should have been one of them.”

Nathan Dennies, who leads history tours of the Jones Falls, echoed those concerns. Melvale Pure Rye was a famous label of Maryland’s celebrated pre-Prohibition whiskeys. Before Kentucky was known for bourbon, there was Maryland rye, with brands such as Pikesville and Melvale. Promotional material for Maryland rye was found in the wreck of the Titanic.

“Melvale Rye Whiskey, distilled in Baltimore, finest whiskey on the market, rich and mellow, 12 years old,” read a New York Times advertisement from 1903 that offered a gallon for $4.

Among whiskey enthusiasts, Maryland rye has been in vogue in recent years. Under Armour’s Kevin Plank has sought to revive the state’s storied booze with his Sagamore Spirit. New Liberty Distillery in Philadelphia launched a heritage collection to commemorate the birth of American whiskey with a reproduction of old Melvale.

“Melvale was a premium rye whiskey in its day,” said Tom Jensen, a co-founder of the Philadelphia distillery. “We loved the story; it went back to the 1880s. We were trying to revive both the brand and the packaging and give it a historical feel.”

The Melvale Distillery was believed to be constructed between 1850-1862, according to documents with the Maryland Historical Trust. Prohibition caused the distillery to change production from rye whiskey to turpentine, then to vinegar. Still, the old mill was “a rare example of a continually operating nineteenth-century distillery in the Jones Falls valley,” architectural historians wrote in nominating the stone building to the National Register of Historic Places.

Fleischmann’s Vinegar Company, Inc. had operated the distillery in recent years, but the company was bought by the billion-dollar international food company Kerry Group in 2018; Kerry has its headquarters in Ireland.

Troubles followed at the Baltimore distillery. Dead fish and polluted waters in the Jones Falls led state authorities to examine the vinegar plant. Environmental inspectors reported the plant had been dumping pollutants into the falls, and vinegar tanks were leaking toward the water, authorities wrote in court documents.

Between April 2022 and January 2024, the company reported, hundreds of gallons of ethyl alcohol and grain vinegar spilled into the falls.

The Maryland Department of the Environment sued and the company agreed in September to pay $1.1 million. The company also announced that it was shutting down production and removing all vinegar.

“Our rivers and waterways must be protected. Our office will not allow companies to put our delicate environment in jeopardy,” said Maryland Attorney General Anthony Brown in a news release announcing the settlement.

As part of the settlement, the company entered into a consent decree to clean up the distillery. The consent decree called for demolition on the grounds and that leaky drains would be sealed. Some of the buildings sat directly on the banks of the falls, but the original stone distillery sat on a hillside away from the water.

The Maryland Department of the Environment did not request that the historic building be demolished, a spokesman said.

Still, there are no apparent legal protections that would block demolition. The distillery does not fall within one of Baltimore’s protected historic districts and it hasn’t been designated a city landmark. Fleischmann’s Vinegar Company paid $5,300 for a city demolition permit. The permit was approved last year and plans show the historic building in the area of demolition.

The demolition contractor declined questions. A spokeswoman for Kerry declined to say if the building was to be knocked down entirely or to share the company’s plans for the property. In an email, she wrote that the company takes its role in Baltimore “extremely seriously” and noted they had obtained all permits and approvals for the work.

Amid the company’s silence, the question remains: Why would Kerry knock down the historic distillery as it walks away?

Theron Russell has been driving past the cupola on his way up and down the Jones Falls Expressway for years. The sight was a pleasant reminder of Baltimore’s rich history.

“When I heard about the demolition,” he said, “I thought, ‘Oh my goodness. I hope it’s not wiping the site clear,’ so I drove down there.”

He saw bricks and debris scattered all around, but the century-old stone distillery was still standing — at least most of it.

“I may drive down in a few days and see a pile of rubble,” he said.