The Jack Daniel’s Distillery

The Jack Daniel’s Distillery is located in tiny Lynchburg, Tennessee (population 361), about an hour southeast of Nashville. Licensed in 1866, it is the oldest registered distillery in the United States and has been certified as a National Historic Site.

Of course I didn’t know any of this as we approached the birthplace of Old No. 7. I just found it odd that the majesty of a distillery left me in awe as we pulled into the parking lot. Quaint brick and wood buildings, bronze statues commemorating Mr. Jack, and cobblestone bridges dot the rolling hills, intersected by a spring fed stream – the secret ingredient in Jack Daniel’s Whiskey (but let’s keep that between us. Wink.).

I laughed to myself when our old prospector tour guide revealed that they have never bothered to find the origin of this spring, instead buying up all the land in the area to avoid pollution. I suspect that the fact that this particular fresh spring water is a necessity to making Old Tennessee Whiskey is the only thing keeping the distillery in Lynchburg County, which has been dry since the prohibition. Even now I am saddened when I think about the lost revenue from all those tourists craving a taste of Jack after the tour.

The visitor center held an exhibit offering the complete history of Jack (Jasper Newton Daniel) and the whiskey. He was born in Lynchburg in 1850, one of 13 children in a poor rural family. At the age of seven he was hired to work for Dan Call, a Lutheran Minister who moonlighted as a whiskey maker. Over the next several years Jack learned everything there was to know about the trade, and at the age of 13 bought Call’s still when increasing pressure from his parishioners persuaded Call to focus on his ministry and abandon his moonshine.

Jack went on to perfect the charcoal mellowing process which to this day gives Jack Daniel’s Whiskey its smooth texture and unique taste. The popularity of his whiskey soared as his abilities were refined, and in 1904 his Old No. 7 Tennessee sipping whiskey was honored as the best on earth at the World’s Fair in St. Louis, Missouri. Jack became a distinguished gentleman, popular with the ladies, throwing lavish parties, wearing the finest clothes. His distillery became a landmark, and his whiskey became a household name.

My traveling companions and I arrived at the distillery just in time to make it on the 7th tour of the day, which is free in honor of Old No. 7. Our tour guide, Old Bill, was a bull of a man that you would expect to see rocking on the front porch with a bottle of booze in his hand and a shotgun on his lap. His shape reminded me of Mr. Potato Head. His grizzled beard, hardened face, worn knuckles, faded overalls, and undecipherable dialect were all distinctly southern. As he cracked during the tour, “I bet you all thought they learned me to talk this way.” They hadn’t. Old Bill was the real deal, born, raised and destined to die in the dirty south.

By the end of the tour we could have been expert whiskey makers. We saw the ingredients (corn, barley and rye) mixed together to form sour mash – so called because the process, which uses a small portion of the previous batch to make the next, is similar to making sourdough bread. We were overwhelmed with the beautifully nauseating scent of pure grain alcohol as it was extracted from the mash. We watched as it leisurely trickled though ten feet of hard-packed sugar maple charcoal in the mellowing process – once in the case of Old No. 7, twice for Gentlemen Jack. We walked through the warehouses storing the whiskey while it ages in barrels made of charred American White Oak, allowing the liquor to breathe as the pores of the wood expand and contract with the temperature. This process gives Jack its smoky flavor and amber tint.

Old Bill, always the entertainer, had a punch-line prepared as we left each room. Whether they be self-depreciating cracks about his beard or sly references to drinking on the job (said with a grin and a wink), they served as bookmarks, signifying the end of one experience and the beginning of another. I wonder if he lived life outside of the distillery the same way, leaping from one place to another with an exclamatory statement and a twitch of the nose. I wonder if I could. Sure, I wouldn’t be able to live any one moment to its fullest, but I would definitely be remembered. In the end isn’t that all we can ask for?

In 1905 Jack Daniel went to the office early one morning and attempted to open his safe. Not able to remember the combination, he kicked the hard steel in a fit of frustration and anger. He broke his toe, and before long infection set in. Bit by bit his leg was amputated till he finally died of blood poisoning in 1911. It’s poetic, really. One of the founding fathers of passionate drunken rage dying from a fit of passionate (drunken?) rage.

After the tour we were all ready to put our newfound whiskey aficionado status to the test, sipping whiskey on the rocks, letting the thick liquid wash over our tongues as we mused on the subtle differences between Old No. 7 and the prestigious Single Barrel. Too bad we were still in dry Lynchburg County. We settled for lukewarm pizza from the Bar-B-Que Caboose to hold us over till we could escape that buzz-killing speck on the map.

Thanks for reading.