Castle & Cairn

  Named after Colonel James E. Pepper (1850-1906), noted horseman and master distiller, this lovely decanter styled bottle hails from a whiskey pedigree older than the American Revolution. Col. Pepper, third in his line to use the family recipe, convinced the state of Kentucky to change its laws to permit distillers to bottle their own whiskey, a right previously allocated to rectifiers (third party blenders/flavor makers) who had a history of adding adulterants or cutting whiskey to make an extra buck. Colonel Pepper began the tradition of affixed a signed seal to the bottle to denote its quality, a provision that became a hallmark of the Bottled-in-Bond Act of 1897 for which he was a chief advocate. The Pepper family continued to operate the historic James E. Pepper Distillery in Lexington as well as the Woodford Reserve Distillery until 1967 when a slow whiskey market forced them to shutter the historic Lexington location and the family brand. In 2008, Amir Peay revived the hi...

📚 Background: Now under the management of Jim Beam in Clermont Kentucky, the Old Grand-Dad brand was named by one Raymond B. Hayden after his grandfather Meredith Basil Hayden Sr. (incidentally the namesake of the Basil Hayden Brand, introduced by Beam in 1992). A truly historic line, the whiskey has been sold under the same name since 1840 and Hayden Sr's face still graces the front of the bottle. The old man was known for using a higher percentage of the more expensive rye in his distilling (the "more costly" small grains alluded to on the back of the bottle). Old Grand-Dad 114 is the highest proof offering of the roster which also features a 100-proof Bottled-in-Bond and an 80-proof budget version, alas reduced from 86 proof in 2013. Together, you may hear Old Grand-Dad and Old Overholt referred to as "The Olds", and Old Grand-Dad's distinctive orange and black visage has graced such cultural sensations as M*A*S*H and Mad Men . Though there have been r...