EllenJ wrote:Still, the general gist of it -- an insider who can have his pick of anything at the distillery personally chose THIS particular barrel as his favorite and we bottled the rest of the contents just for you -- still strikes me as just a bit suspect.
First of all, John, come on, that's not what it says at all, not even remotely, and it wouldn't, since the gauger story wasn't promulgated by someone trying to sell whiskey or anything else. It was put out there by Sally Van Winkle, researched for her by Sam Thomas. The only disagreement I have with her is that she thinks Pappy believed the original story and didn't know the later one, while I suspect he did.
Mike is correct that the conclusion that Fitzgerald was the "government man" at Old Judge is mine. He may have been at a bonded warehouse at another location, but why would Herbst have a bonded warehouse at a location other than at his sole Kentucky distillery? However, Sam Cecil's statement (undoubtedly from Whit Coyte) that Fitzgerald went on to be the "superintendent" of a distillery in Hammond, Indiana, which is in my neck of the woods (i.e., Chicago), puts him nearer to Milwaukee (where Herbst was based) than to Frankfort, Kentucky. So maybe he wasn't at Old Judge.
I wonder, Mike, if you have ever asked Mary Hite about this, as she is Tom Bixler's granddaughter (i.e., Claude's grand-niece).
That Fitzgerald was a gauger seems beyond doubt as "a certain individual who carried keys to a bonded warehouse" seems unlikely to refer to anything else. Even the owner of the distillery would not have had those keys.
It also seems beyond doubt that there never was an Old Fitzgerald Distillery (until Norton-Simon renamed SW) except as a DBA for Old Judge.
(See
The Bourbon Country Reader Volume 5, Numbers 1 and 2 for more information.)