Old Taylor Bourbon

Old Taylor Bourbon

 

 

Old Taylor Distillery

Two decades after James Crow's death, the second

"father" of Bourbon began his work, also here along Glenn's

Creek. Colonel Edmund H. Taylor began his distillery-

owner's career at the O.F.C. distillery in Leestown (which

later became Ancient Age). After turning over ownership

to his partner George T. Stagg, Taylor built a new distillery

on Glenn's Creek. It has been called one of the most

remarkable sights in the bourbon industry. The main

distillery building is made entirely of limestone blocks, in

the form of a medieval castle, complete with turrets. A

drawing of the castle appears on the label of Old Taylor

Bourbon. The castle wasn't just a facade, either; inside

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

were gardens and ornate rooms where Colonel Taylor used

to entertain important government officials and politicians.

Taylor's contribution was the guarantee of quality in an

industry that had lost nearly all credibility. Very few

distillers were selling quality product, and virtually none of

what good bourbon was being made ever got to the public

without being diluted, polluted, and rectified. Edmund

Taylor crusaded tirelessly to have laws passed that would

ensure quality product, and he was successful. He was the

originator of what became known as the Bottled-in-Bond

act of 1897. This was essentially a federal subsidy by tax

deferral for product made to strict government standards

and stored under government supervision. In the process,

he was responsible for documenting what those standards

would be. And therefore, Edmund H. Taylor, Jr. was given

the task of defining Straight Bourbon Whiskey. As a result

of the success of this act, other federally enforced

standards for food products were enacted, and we can

say we owe much of our current standards in many

consumable products to this gentleman with a distillery on

Glenn's Creek.

Well, maybe a couple of

distilleries. Actually, Col.

Taylor owned or had an

interest in several

plants, including the

Pepper distillery and

Frankfort distillery, and

even the Stagg distillery

in Leestown was actually

known as the E.H.Taylor Jr. Company.

Edmund Taylor remained a very powerful figure

in the bourbon industry well into the twentieth century. He

died, at the age of 90, in 1922.

 

I'd read earlier that the Old Taylor place, which is built in

the style of a stone castle, had been purchased by an ex-

employee of Old Crow, who has opened a museum and has

also produced a very small amount of bourbon which he is

scheduled to release this year. We had expected the

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

place, now called Stone Castle Distillery to be a couple

miles or so down the road, so we were very surprised to

find that the large expanse of sheds and whiskey

warehouses through which Glenn's Creek Road winds

included both distilleries.

We were surprised to find Old Taylor located literally right

next door to the Old Crow place. In fact, they appear to

have shared some warehouses and, according to Cecil

Withrow, the bearded, white-haired ex-boilermaker who

now owns it, they even shared production facilities at one

time. Cecil is a collector with a special fascination for Old

Crow and Old Taylor. He has lots of Crow decanters,

pictures, bottles, and other memorabilia. Oh, yes, and a

distillery! He told us he is indeed ready to bottle some

product (purchased, not produced) but he doesn't have it

together yet. Meantime, he's slowly restoring the distillery.

He showed us photos of the main building where most of

the restoration has been done. It's really beautiful. There

is also a restaurant scheduled to open this spring.

 

We spent most of our time (we will be back for a more

thorough tour) in the main bottling room, which Cecil has

divided up into museum-like displays and flea-market

booths, mostly dedicated to whiskey memorabilia. We

spent a long, fascinating time there and bought a couple

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

nice items. We got a Kentucky Tavern decanter with the

name written in gold on the glass and we got a Jack

Daniel's Barrelhouse No. 1 bottle, complete with tag and

wooden case. That was priced at $18.00 but Cecil let us

have it for even less. We later saw those bottles in nearly

identical condition selling for nearly one hundred dollars.

 

From Stonecastle/Old Taylor we continued down Glenn's

Creek Road, as it became McCracken Pike and passed

Labrot & Graham, then drove on through Versailles toward

Lawrenceburg. We passed Wild Turkey Distillery in Tyrone

along the way.