Ep. 16 - Steve Beam of Limestone Branch and Yellowstone
YELLOWSTONE, BEAMS AND DANTS // From the history of the old brand, to the experience of being a craft distillery on the forefront of a boom.
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Show Notes
This interview pairs nicely with the Whiskey Lore Story Episode: The Making of a Whiskey Ghost Town
When I started researching the Dant family for the Season 2 episodes on New Hope, it was almost impossible not to also reach into the Beams family tree and see several ties in both marriage and business as well.
And the Yellowstone brand is likely the most obvious tie between the two - with it first being distilled by J.B. Dant - or Bernard as he was known - on the property that now houses Log Still Distillery. And it's a brand that would go through several owners before finally making it's way back to the family through LuxCo.
So I not only wanted to ask Steve about the history of Yellowstone, but I also wanted to jump into some family history and try to make some more connections between the Beams and the Dants. And I was curious about a bottle of whiskey I saw they produced early on called T.J. Pottinger's, whose namesake was a distiller in New Hope in the second half of the 19th century.
And later in the conversation, I dive more into Steve and Paul's process for getting into the whiskey business, during a time when the craft distilling boom was still far off into the future.
In this interview we discuss:
- The Charles Townsend Yellowstone story
- T.J. Pottinger, Captain Sam, and Walnut Hill
- Lost history and hauntings
- The Dants, the Burch, and the Bowlings
- The Limestone Branch of the Beam/Dant family
- Minor Case Beam at Early Times
- Olene Parker's Old Maid and Francis Head at Gethsemane
- Where Minor's name came from
- How the Dants lost Yellowstone and how it came back to the Beams
- Yellowstone distillery in Louisville
- Yellowstone's popularity in Kentucky
- Heaven Hill and LuxCo
- The fate of Henry McKenna, J.W. Dant, Yellowstone, Rebel Yell, Ezra Brooks, and David Nicholson
- Getting the Yellowstone name back in the family
- There's a Beam everywhere in Kentucky
- The J.W. Dant distillery and the whiskey in the 50s
- How Steve became interested in distilling
- The New Hampshire man's yeast bucket advice
- Dry Fly and American Distilling Group in the
- Learning on a small scale
- Focusing on something unique
- Waiting on that first batch as a master distiller
- The Beams secrets at Thanksgiving
Listen to the full episode with the player above or find it on Spotify, Apple or your favorite podcast app under "Whiskey Lore: The Interviews." The full transcript and resources talked about in this episode are available on the tab(s) above.
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Transcript
Drew (00:15):
Welcome to Whiskey Lore, the interviews. I'm your host, drew Hennish, Amazon bestselling author of Whiskey Lores Travel Guide to Experience in Kentucky Bourbon. And I want to welcome you to an encore interview from back in 2020, an interview with Steve Beam, the master distiller and co-founder of Limestone Branch Distillery in Lebanon, Kentucky. And you may know them better as the makers of Yellowstone Bourbon, and if that last name Beam sounds a little familiar, it really probably should. I mean, they are the first family of bourbon, but Steve and his brother Paul actually traced their roots back through to the Dent family, and namely the original log still distiller j w Dent. And when I started researching the D Family for season two of whiskey lore, my stories around New Hope was almost impossible not to also reach into the Beam Family Tree and see several ties both in marriage and in business as well.
(01:23):
And the Yellowstone brand is likely the most obvious tie between the two with it first being distilled by JB Dance or Bernard as he was known. And that distillation happened on the property that now houses the log still distillery. And it's a brand that would go through several owners finally making its way back to the family through Luxo. So I not only wanted to ask Steve about the history of Yellowstone, but I also wanted to jump into some of the family history and try to make a few more connections between the beams and the dance. I was also a little curious about the bottle of whiskey I had seen at the Oscar Getz Museum that they produced early on called TJ Pots, and that namesake was a distiller in New Hope in the second half of the 19th century. And a little later on in the conversation, I'm going to dive a little bit more into Steve and Paul's process for getting into the whiskey business during a time when craft distilling was still in its infancy.
(02:25):
And we may throw out some names you've heard of before, early times, makers, Mark Taylor and Williams, old Maid, some of these old legacy brands and some brands that are still around that are all tied in with the beams and the dance at one point or another. So I originally met this as a research interview. We're just sitting on the porch relaxing and kind of chatting back and forth, but there was so much great history that Steve was giving this particular conversation that I thought it'd be fun to share this with you so that you could hear some of that history and put some of the pieces together. So I'm sipping a Kentucky mule. We are kind of kicked back on the front porch and ready to jump into a conversation. So here is my conversation with Master distiller Steve Beam talking a little bit about Yellowstone because this one's been interesting for me as well. Let you tell the story first, the Charles Townsend story, and then I have some questions about it.
Steve (03:37):
Yeah, the story goes that Bernard was selling whiskey from Cold Springs to Taylor and Williams who was the distributor, and that they had a salesman. Taylor and Williams had a salesman who went out west and came back. And I've heard a couple different things. I heard that there was a lottery or people submitted names and that Yellowstone came up or that he came back and was very excited about the park and everybody knew that the park was, it was the first national park and that he said that they should name the bourbon Yellowstone after the park. And that's the story that has been propagated and continued for as long as I can remember.
Drew (04:24):
And so the park opened in 1872, and I've read that he left as early as 1871, which would be a really long vacation. But of course getting out west,
Steve (04:35):
I don't think he was on vacation. I think he was working.
Drew (04:38):
Oh, was he? Okay. He's
Steve (04:39):
Out outselling.
Drew (04:40):
Okay. Okay. Yeah. And so did he come straight back and immediately they started creating the whiskey? Or was that brand
Steve (04:49):
They had the whiskey? Yeah, because they had been distilling for a while. So it was the brand that they created. Okay.
Drew (04:56):
So it have been probably around 1872 that they would've been able to do that quickly and get it out.
Steve (05:03):
Yeah, because it would've been a brand, not it's, they're having the started distill and make whiskey right, because they have the whiskey and then they also want to do it quickly before anybody else did it. Right. So there would be an urgency as well, because later on there'd be a mammoth cave brand. So the national parks were used in distillery names. So
Drew (05:32):
Another brand that's actually tied to you guys, I saw, I guess when you first opened, you started selling moonshine and a sugar shine because I was over at Oscar Getz Yes. Museum. And I saw a bottle of TJ Pottinger that looked like it had been typed on there. I thought at first when I looked at it, I said, oh man, that's, that's what they did back 1890, whatever.
Steve (05:59):
And that's, that's what the look we were going
Drew (06:01):
For. Was it? Okay.
Steve (06:02):
Absolutely, yes. Yeah. So TJ Pottinger, Thomas Jefferson Pottinger, who was descendant of Captain Sam Pottinger really, who kind of founded this, that area around New Hope, and that's where my family all were from. And Captain Sam came, he was actually served in the Revolutionary War, and he came to that area with Tara and one of the guys, Louisville, I don't know if it was Oldham, one of the Shelby, maybe one of the counties, another county named Dakron. Okay. And kind of claimed that area before the Revolutionary War. And then he came back right after the Revolutionary
Drew (06:48):
War, and that's when he set up the fort. Right. And then he, Walnut Hill, which was a house that we were talking about is unheard of at that time period, this far out west to be building this Maryland style house that unfortunately that's the
Steve (07:06):
First brick home east west of the Allegheny. Yeah.
Drew (07:12):
Yep. So would've been impressive to see, I guess it got knocked down in the 1940s or so. Yeah.
Steve (07:18):
Actually, my mother's uncle bought the property and the house was already in disrepair, and so they tore the house down and built a new house. Back then everybody wanted new modern, they didn't want those old cold drafty houses, but the meat house is still there.
(07:40):
The meat house is still there. And my mom remembers going into that house before they tore it down. And she said there were, of course, she said it was her and her, a few of her girlfriends, and they were early teens. And there's rumor that somebody had, or a story that somebody had hung themself committed suicide in a closet. And so they were, that's all haunted type thing. But she said they remembered going, she remembers going into a room, and she said a whole closet was just filled with correspondence letters and things, and that they talked about the Native Americans and all the different things, but all that was burned. Oh.
Drew (08:25):
Oh, that's painful. It is.
Steve (08:28):
Because it would've been from the very beginning of Kentucky. And so it is really sad that things like that just weren't valued and were just
Drew (08:40):
Disappeared. Yeah. So it would be fine if it was an accident, right?
Steve (08:45):
No, but it was just
Drew (08:48):
Junk go. Yeah. I think that's what disappoints me a little bit about our history, that I don't think people really got accurate with history or wanted to preserve history until the late 19th century, early 20th century. And all of the stories that probably could have been told from New Hope and that whole area are just gone because they weren't not even tax records to chase after. That's the hardest part about doing bourbon history is right. You can't always find records because when we're going back to the early days, they weren't documenting things or if they were, we've not seen any of that.
Steve (09:34):
The one thing group that did keep good records for the Catholic Church. And so a lot of things come through the church records as well. And of course, three sides of my family came to Pottinger Station. So the dance, the Birches and the Bowlings,
Drew (09:59):
Okay.
Steve (09:59):
Were three of the original 25 families that came with Basil Hayden
Drew (10:05):
To
Steve (10:05):
Pottinger Station.
Drew (10:08):
So how does your Beam family, and I know it gets very difficult to nail this down, but I'm sure you've had to do it enough times. How do you travel down to where you meet up with the dance?
Steve (10:25):
Okay, so Jacob Beam was the original beam that traveled into Kentucky, and then he had a grandson, Joseph, and that's the ranch that we came off of. Okay. There was actually split into three different branches of distilling Beam at that point. Okay. Joseph was the oldest, David was the middle son, and John Henry, they called him. Jack was the youngest. Okay. John Henry started early times. David was Jim Bean's father, and he moved his distillery out over by Nazareth. Parts of the are still
Drew (11:09):
There. Was that where Clear Springs was south of sort of between Bardstown and Claremont?
Steve (11:18):
Yeah. Well, it's right in on right behind Nazareth. Okay. Right there in Bardstown. Okay. It's just right outside of
Drew (11:25):
Bargetown. Oh, okay.
Steve (11:26):
And that's where his
Drew (11:27):
Distillery was. Is that the one that was around till the 1940s or,
Steve (11:30):
I think so. There's still warehouses
Drew (11:32):
There. Oh, okay. All right.
Steve (11:34):
Heaven Hill owns it now. Then our ancestor was Joseph, and we don't have a whole lot of distilling history on him when his father died, which was David. Yeah. All these names
Drew (11:52):
Retrace,
Steve (11:52):
Keep coming up again. But David, when David died, he died young in, I think in his fifties without a will. So his property was sold in on the Washington County Courthouse. And we have a record of where Joseph bought the, still that his father still, so we're thinking that he either stayed at the original distillery site or had a small distillery there as well. Okay. Because he bought the still and some of the distilling essentials. And then also I was reading and see, I read these things and then I forget where you I, I've read them right.
Drew (12:37):
Little
Steve (12:38):
Tits. But I remember reading that Elmo Bean who was distilled at Maker's Mark, said someone had called him a master distiller and he said, no, my grandfather was a true master distiller, and his grandfather would have been that Joe, my Oh, okay. So that's who he, because his father was Joe. Yeah. And then his grandfather would've been Joe M Beam.
Drew (13:08):
So when we get down to Minor, when we get down to minor case beam, minor case Beam is the son of Joe,
Steve (13:16):
Joel? No, Joe M Yeah.
Drew (13:18):
Joe M Yeah. But he actually went to work for Jack Beam. Correct. So kind of family tying in together.
Steve (13:26):
Yeah. Very close with Jack.
Drew (13:27):
Okay.
Steve (13:28):
Yeah. So minor case was Joe L Joe, M Joe, the older Joe's son, and he went to work for his Uncle Jack at early times. And when he was 28, he bought into the distillery in Gethsemane
Drew (13:52):
With Francis Head,
Steve (13:53):
Which was head, it was at Okay. Parker and Head before.
Drew (13:56):
Okay. All right. New one for me. I didn't know that.
Steve (13:59):
Yeah, Lene Parker. Okay. Oh, it was Francis Heads partner, and Oling a character unto himself. He's in Cincinnati Bay, south Cincinnati, and he was evidently like a PT Barnum of Cincinnati.
Drew (14:20):
Nice. And
Steve (14:21):
So Bean bought Parker's interest out of that. And Oing Parker's brand was Old Maid.
Drew (14:29):
Okay.
Steve (14:29):
And you might, that pops up every once in a while. Okay.
Drew (14:32):
Yeah.
Steve (14:33):
And so anyway, minor bought him out and then eventually bought Head out and then ran that distillery from the 1880s. And I guess I could do the math from when Miner was born 28 to when he passed off the Distill. And then I know that they said that he sold it in 1810, but I, I've seen records of whiskey from 1811. So right in that area, 10 18, 10 to eight would've
Drew (15:09):
Been 18, 10 or
Steve (15:09):
1910, yeah. Yeah, yeah. 19. Yeah, 1910. Okay. Yeah, yeah, yeah. We just went from the 17 hundreds.
Drew (15:16):
He lived a long time. He has an interesting name. I, I'll often wonder whether he was named after a, as I walk through the Churchyard Holy Cross Churchyard. Right. I saw the last name Minor, and it made me wonder whether his name actually was a name that just came about because of a previous
Steve (15:40):
Marriage. That's that, that's what we think that either they were named after a good friend or someone. There's a lot of people, if you look back, there's a lot of people in this area that were named after people. People wouldn't have to necessarily be a relative, but someone that they respected or was Okay. I prominent in the community. So yeah. Actually, my cousin has a theory and she does most of our genealogy for the beams, but she believes that the minor and Case were two concernings. Okay. That were put together. Yeah.
Drew (16:19):
That's very interesting.
Steve (16:20):
And I always ask my dad later in life, I was like, dad, where'd it come from? He didn't know that. I was like, didn't anybody ever think to ask where'd that come from?
Drew (16:32):
Maybe even he didn't know.
Steve (16:34):
And he always went by mc.
Drew (16:36):
Okay. And it was Mc head, right. Was the company after, I mean
Steve (16:42):
Mc Beaman company
Drew (16:43):
After Francis Head.
Steve (16:45):
Right.
Drew (16:46):
Passed away or left the business. Right. Yeah. And then after, did he live to see the end of Prohibition?
Steve (16:53):
He died shortly after prohibition. Okay. About right around 150 days after prohibition ended, he died.
Drew (17:01):
So at that point, Yellowstone was under Taylor and Williams
Steve (17:07):
And owned by the dams.
Drew (17:08):
Okay. So what happened to Yellowstone after that? How did it get back to you?
Steve (17:15):
Okay. Well, after prohibition, Mike, Dan had, alright, so JB had several sons, I think they were around seven at least, that were all distillers. Not to be confused with jw, who had all those sons who were distillers. And actually the generations kind of mixed because JW had so many children that some of the younger children were almost the age as the children of the oldest. So it gets very
Drew (17:56):
Confusing. Genealogy nightmare. Yeah.
Steve (17:58):
So Mike, Dan became president of Taylor and Williams after Bernard died. And so Mike, Dan and his brothers ran that, ran it through, actually through Prohibition because they licensed the name to Brown Foreman and sold Yellowstone through Brown Foreman.
Drew (18:19):
And that's how it survived
Steve (18:20):
Prohibition. And that's how survived Prohibition Prohibition. And that's how they managed to keep money flowing and were able to build a massive distillery after prohibition. So they built the distillery after prohibition, and then in 1944, Mike, who had two daughters and a son, but the son was a special needs son. And so I guess he just figured that it would best to sell the distillery. And he sold the distillery to Glenmore the Thompson family. And so then the Thompson family ran Yellowstone from 1944 until about 19 92, 9 93 in that area. In that time it was sold to United Distillers. Shortly after United bought Yellowstone, they merged with Guinness and became Diagio. And then the powers that be in England decided that they didn't want to have anything to do with the bourbon. So they shut the distillery down and sold off all the brands.
Drew (19:36):
So this was the end of the Cold Spring distillery?
Steve (19:38):
No, that's the big distillery in Louisville. Oh, okay. On Seventh Street Road. That was the Yellowstone Distillery in Louisville.
Drew (19:46):
Okay. So I missed that. When did it move? They
Steve (19:51):
Built after Prohibition. Right after Prohibition. Okay. Actually, my grandfather, I have check from him at the end of Prohibition. So they were working there, getting everything ready to get going. So they had that distillery up and running at At when prohibition ended, they were there. So they took that time during Prohibition and moved it down there. So
Drew (20:18):
It's interesting to me that, and I learned this while I was on your tour here about Yellowstone's popularity in the state of Kentucky. Right now, after doing all of these other whiskeys that I've been chasing, everybody seems to say, okay, we were the most popular. Whiskey four Roses was the most popular after World War ii. And the old Crow was still very popular in the forties and fifties, and Yellowstone was also very popular, but it was actually in Kentucky. In
Steve (20:48):
Kentucky, and it was the biggest, best seller. It was the bestseller in Kentucky in the 1960s and seventies that that's been collaborated by several different people. And one of the people who worked in the shipping department at Yellowstone at that time came in and he was talking, and he said that a third of all the whiskey sold in Kentucky was Yellowstone. And I know that I talked to Bill Samuels and he said when he started, he said Yellowstone was not only the most popular, but he said it was the most popular by far. Wow. So he didn't give percentage, but he said by far,
Drew (21:31):
Yeah. Yeah. And so the next move after Diageo took it over, and they weren't really interested in bourbon.
Steve (21:37):
Right. Heaven Hill and Luxo, which was the David Sherman company at that time, worked out a deal between them to buy the brand and then kind of divvy them up. And so Heaven Hill got JW Dan at that time, I believe Henry McKenna was in that as well. Several they, heaven Hill got several of the brands, and Luxo got Yellowstone Rebel Yellow and Ezra Brooks and maybe
Drew (22:12):
A few, the David Nicholson I think is yes,
Steve (22:14):
David Nicholson,
Drew (22:15):
Who was making Yellowstone during this year.
Steve (22:18):
So during the 92, from 1992 until 2015, and actually until even, we're still sourcing from Luxo stocks. So that's where we get everything we source comes from Luxo stocks. So
Drew (22:38):
How hard is it to negotiate getting a famous brand like that into your new distillery?
Steve (22:45):
Well, when Bourbon lost favor and started losing favor in the seventies and eighties, Yellowstone fell really hard as well. And so it was kind of just one of those lost brands. And so Lco was happy to partner with us and they liked what we were doing, and we brought the brand over to Limestone branch.
Drew (23:10):
Was that an early idea that you had when you started the distillery, that that's a brand you wanted? What
Steve (23:16):
I either JW Dan or Yellowstone I Okay. Really wanted to. Yeah. And JW Dan was probably a little bit more of a difficult, it would've been much more difficult, but Yellowstone, it worked out well because Yellowstone was actually the brand that touched my family the most on both sides because the beams and the dance collaborated. My grandfather was a distiller there. A couple of the beans were distillers there up until the forties and fifties. So it definitely crossed both of the families
Drew (23:59):
With all the heritage of the beams in the world of distilling. Does it seem strange that you and Paul are the only two that actually are owning a distillery under the Beam name?
Steve (24:19):
There was such so prolific at one time and to be come down to just us, but Ben Beam has gone
Drew (24:33):
Through's,
Steve (24:34):
Right? Yeah. So there, it's
Drew (24:35):
Like everywhere I go, I bump into a beam.
Steve (24:39):
So there's more, of course, like I said, the seventies, eighties things had then there wasn't a lot of opportunity, so a lot of people moved on as well. But now that the opportunities and to be able to open on a scale that it isn't so massive, I think you may seem more as well, and just we're talking to the dance, my cousin with the dance, that was a family too. That was one of the most prominent families in Kentucky Distilling that just completely disappeared.
Drew (25:21):
That's the amazing thing of seeing it pop back up and the ability to tell the story of that side of the fan. Because the first time I was here and I saw JW Dance picture in here, I had no clue who he was. And I don't know that JW Dan, the brand is widely available. I've never seen it in my end of the country. No.
Steve (25:47):
It's a, it's regional brand. I'm not sure where they place it, but it, it's in certain regions,
Drew (25:54):
And so the tough part has to sometimes be seeing it on the bottom shelf,
Steve (25:58):
But it gets great reviews. People love it. Yeah. They really do. Even though it's there, they talk about it being a great value brand. So I
Drew (26:09):
Will say that even though Heaven Hill seems to own all a whole plethora of legacy brands, the stuff that they sell that is bottom shelf usually is pretty decent. So that helps.
Steve (26:24):
Yeah. But it is good to see people enjoying jw. Dan and I tell you, if you can get some JW Dan from the fifties, forties or fifties from the Yosemite Distillery, it's really, really good stuff. Is it? Really good stuff.
Drew (26:42):
So you've had a chance to taste
Steve (26:44):
That. I haven't had a chance to taste that. And it, it's great. And so I'm excited to see what Wally can do over there.
Drew (26:54):
So how did you get into the business? What were you doing before Limestone Branch?
Steve (27:00):
So I had always been interested in getting in the business since, gosh, my mom took us around when I was a kid to the old distillery sites, kind of like what you did today and different things. And I have to credit my mom more so than my dad with getting me interested in distilling history. And because she was very proud of being a descendant of JW Dan. And so she talked about it a lot. And so I did a fair amount of research and we had old bottles and labels and different memorabilia. So I guess I was bitten by the bug, but at the same time, I was always interested in horticulture too. That's just coming up was my, just my passion when I was younger. And so I went to school for landscape architecture, and after I graduated, I looked into opening of the story, but at that time, you still had to have a gauger on site.
(28:04):
So I mean, it was just crazy insane. So I kind of put the thought away, but thought I may come back to it someday. Then actually at Jim Beam's 200th anniversary, we went over and I was talking to a distributor, actually, he was worked for the state because it was New Hampshire, and he worked for the State of New Hampshire. And we were talking and I said, well, I have the recipe JW dance yeast recipe, and talks about use a bucket of this and this. And he said, well, you should open a distillery and tell people you make it with a bucket. This. So that, again, then that kind of lit the fire a little bit, and I kind of kept putting my foot in and eventually people forget there wasn't an internet, so things were Exactly, were not easy to find or
Drew (29:05):
Yeah, yeah, absolutely. No YouTube videos to check out
Steve (29:09):
And couldn't Google something and have everything pop up. But I do remember back in the old dialup days, starting to see things, and then actually I saw Fritz Maytag out in San Francisco and Dry Fly, and they had opened, and that kind of really got me interested. And then Bill Owens with American Distilling Institute had started that group. So I started getting hits on that. Like I said, this is all infancy of the internet. And so the Adi had a conference here in Louisville, I guess that was 2008. And I went to that and I told my brother, I was like, it's now or never. So yeah, hard. And I didn't look back.
Drew (30:07):
Was he hard to convince?
Steve (30:08):
He took a little bit of convincing. You talk to him. He doesn't say he was, but it took a little long longer to convince. But he, he came around and it's been great.
Drew (30:21):
So you had to quickly learn how to be a master distiller.
Steve (30:25):
And I, I read everything that I could possibly get my hands on, visited a couple of the small distillers that I took classes. I took a class in Chicago and different places than I had a friend, Sherman Owen and his family had been involved in unrecorded distilling for a long time.
Drew (30:53):
They call it illicit, still distilling over there in Scotland.
Steve (30:56):
And he was very helpful because you could talk to people who'd worked in the distilleries here in Kentucky, and they're used to 10,000 gallon mash tubs. Yeah. But when you're talking about a hundred gallon mash tub, it, it's a whole different animal. So Sherman was able to teach me on that scale. So that was invaluable knowledge. And
Drew (31:33):
I see you with a pot still. Correct. So that was really your interest was let's not looking to be the biggest around. We're looking to create something unique and
Steve (31:45):
Something unique, something that reflected our heritage and history and the beginnings of it. So the pot still plus there. And there was also not a lot of distilling equipment back in 2008 when we were started looking, the choices were very limited. There was just three or four manufacturers. Then Dome wasn't even really making small stills at that time. I remember talking to David Sherman, Rob Sherman, and he was said, well, I don't know. This is even when I was just thinking about going into the business. And he was like, I don't know. See if these smallest distill make it or not. They're starting to pop up,
Drew (32:32):
Pumping you full of confidence.
Steve (32:35):
But it's been a good journey. And it just so happened to coincide with the bourbon boon because I didn't plan it that way. Yeah, I did. Who knew? Yeah, I,
Drew (32:46):
It's been dead for,
Steve (32:48):
In 2008 there were, it was starting to shine some. Yeah. But not anything what it would become four years later. Yeah.
Drew (32:56):
So what was that first batch? Were you terrified as you're sitting here putting together? I mean, there's a lot of expense that goes in and you have to kind of wait to find out if it's going to be any good. And you're talking about, had you already started to process on Yellowstone the name at that point? No. Okay. No. So you were going to do this under your own banner, right.
Steve (33:18):
Until TJ Pottinger and then eventually probably minor case we would use. And yes. So that Yellowstone was, I would thought that was kind of a goal eventually, but that happened quicker than I thought as well. Yeah.
Drew (33:36):
So how long was it before you said, okay, I think we got something here?
Steve (33:41):
Well, it was a struggle in the beginning because we were out in the middle of nowhere and people didn't know what a craft the story was. And there were just a few others here in the state. And so it wasn't an immediate success. So we struggled along, but it didn't really make too much difference because we were enjoying what we were doing, and that was what we wanted. And we figured it, if we enjoy what we do and put out a good product, then we'd be as successful as we need to be. So here we are.
Drew (34:22):
So what happened to TJ Poter Sugar Shine
Steve (34:26):
When we have such limited capacity that when we partnered with Luxo and brought the Yellowstone name on board, we devoted all of our time just to Yellowstone
Drew (34:39):
Bourn and
Steve (34:39):
Bourbon making Bourbon. Yeah.
Drew (34:41):
Okay.
Steve (34:42):
And we can't make enough for what our projections are now, so we can't take the time to make other products right now.
Drew (34:52):
Yeah. Was there ever a time that you were, because to me, what I love about this industry is that whether it's in Scotland or a tier, all the other distillers seem to be a helping hand if you need it. Oh,
Steve (35:07):
Absolutely. So
Drew (35:08):
You find that here, and plus you, you've got Beam in the name, you would think that there's a few family members you might be able to tap on the shoulder.
Steve (35:15):
Yeah, everybody has been really helpful. The small distilleries, especially when we were all first starting, there was five or six of us, and we were met on a regular basis and shared information and things. But still, everybody's very supportive. The whole industry from large down, and it's been like that. And they've welcomed us from day one. So it's been good that way. Nice. And we were lucky because I hear other states, it doesn't necessarily work that way. So it's been good. And it's a tradition here in Kentucky, and I tell people 50 years ago, everybody was related that was working in the
Drew (35:59):
Right. So
Steve (36:00):
It
Drew (36:01):
Still have that advantage.
Steve (36:04):
That's our buddy. I was fortunate to meet Buddy Thompson about a year before he passed away. He was with Glen Moore. Okay. And we were talking and he said, yeah, he said, everybody talked about their recipe, their secrets and all that. And he said, and then we all knew that the beams got together at Thanksgiving and there wasn't any secrets.
Drew (36:28):
That's crazy. It's fun learning about though, for sure. Definitely is. Well, I appreciate the time and Oh, no problem. Great. Great talking history. Always great talking history. Yeah, absolutely. And if you want to hear the story of the Dance in Full, you can check out episodes nine and 10 from season two of the Whiskey Lore podcast. And to learn more about Limestone Branch Distillery and yellowstone@thelimestonebranch.com. If you want to keep up with my whiskey travels well, make sure to follow me on youtube.com, instagram.com or facebook.com/whiskey lore. And now twitter.com/whiskey. I'm your host, drew Hamish. Until next time, cheers and Slah Whiskey Lores of production of Travel Fuel's Life, L L C.