I never knew moonshine was ever good for anything else other than getting you obnoxiously drunk and the slight chance of losing your eyesight. Turns out it’s responsible for causing the best thing that ever happened to mankind, which is modified cars.

It all started back in the 1920’s during Prohibition where alcohol was made illegal as was the production of it. But once you make something illegal you know everyone’s just going to want it more, so thanks to gangsters like Al Capone who made it easy to get your hands on alcohol by paying small-town brewers(bootleggers) to make it for a cut-price to distribute in speakeasies.

Law enforcement was not blind to the activities, forcing bootleggers to operate at night. This is where the term “moonshine” comes from. Getting away from the law enforcement is where go-fast cars come into play. Cars were still a fairly recent thing so police cars were only as fast as ordinary cars. So if bootleggers were able to put a little more power behind their cars they would be able to outrun the police without a problem. Some had to transport the moonshine over Canadian borders and long distance so there was a greater chance for run-ins with law enforcement. While the cars looked like an everyday driver, they were modified on the inside by the drivers transporting the moonshine. The cars were modified to have more power and better handling, while being capable of carrying more weight with more space for more cargo.

Even though Prohibition was repealed in 1933, these modified cars created a new culture of car enthusiastic people. Car modifications continued to grow and improve for better performance as it is still to this day. It even lead to the making of stock car racing and NASCAR.