Buffalo Trace was one of only four distilleries allowed to remain open. Prohibition closed down almost every alcohol producer in the country, but for a select few. Buffalo Trace was only one of four distilleries boozing it up over Prohibition. And yes, you can technically toast him with any of the delicious craft bourbon’s he helped pave the way for there’s also an Elmer T. Beyond basically saving the bourbon industry, he worked at the distillery from 1949 until his retirement in 1985. Fortunately clearer heads prevailed (someone told Lee to just show up anyway) and Lee eventually became the distillery’s first master distiller. When Lee first applied to work at Buffalo Trace, he was turned away. (And we haven’t un-obsessed ourselves yet.) Lee reincarnated modern bourbon. Rather than learn to love a Dirty Martini, Lee created a bourbon that radically emphasized the process and nuance behind quality bourbon, creating the first-ever single barrel bourbon, Blanton’s Single Barrel, and introducing thirsty Americans to the concept of premium bourbon in general. Long story short, Lee came up in the distillery as bourbon was at a low point (i.e., actually struggling against vodka and gin). And Buffalo Trace almost didn’t hire him! (See below.) It did, and bourbon in general is better off for it, since Lee - its first ever master distiller - basically resuscitated bourbon (his New York Times obit gives a hint of the glint of his bourbon star power).

Buffalo Trace’s first-ever master distiller basically reinvented bourbon.Īmong the most important names on the Buffalo Trace roster is that of Elmer T.

Blanton (who kept the distillery running through Prohibition and was in many ways responsible for turning the distillery itself into a focal point of bourbon culture), even Pappy Van Winkle himself (a name that sounds like a bourbon elf, if such a thing existed, he was that magical, see below). Taylor (a descendent of Presidents Madison and Taylor) George Stagg (the business-savvy bourbon innovator for whom the distillery was named for about a century) Albert B. Buffalo Trace’s head honchos were the heavy hitters of bourbon.īuffalo Trace’s historic lineage is like a who’s who of bourbon: There’s the founder, Colonel E. Indeed, it is “a rare, intact example of a distillery operating before, during, and after Prohibition,” according to Buffalo Trace’s own award submission. The Buffalo Trace distillery is a National Historic Landmark.īuffalo Trace was declared a National Historic Landmark in 2013, in large part because it’s the oldest continuously operating distillery in America. The connection to distilling isn’t only geographic: Those traces became essential routes for explorers, settlers, farmers, and other early American professionals (as this was before the age of the Influencer, who can largely work remotely or anywhere near ice cream). The name honors old local “buffalo trace” roadways stamped onto the landscape by actual buffalo roaming the untamed wilderness of early America. It was finally and decisively rechristened Buffalo Trace in 1999. Stagg Company, named after its second owner. It was later, and for the longest period, called George T. First, it was the Old Fire Copper Distillery. The distillery had a few names over the years.

Buffalo trace whiskey