Talk about hard to believe. Imagine Steve Jobs pulling a PC out of his briefcase.  Or the CEO of Ford Motor Co. driving up to a board meeting in a spanking new Camaro.  Most  folks would find it curious to see a Pepsi man sipping a Diet Coke, a CNN correspondent turning to FOX for his news. But welcome to Kentucky, where Master Distillers think nothing of imbibing a rival product. Nay, most would hesitate to call another distillery a rival at all, and their mood towards each other not merely congenial but distinctly familial. When Jimmy Russell of Wild Turkey bourbon swings into the grounds of Buffalo Trace Distillery for a Saturday morning visit, there is no frantic rush to hide trade secrets, no sneaking the playbook out a hidden trap door. Elmer T. Lee, Master Distiller at Buffalo Trace, greets Russell with a big smile and asks him why it’s been so long since he’s seen him. “Jimmy Russell, I’m awfully happy you stopped by. Sit down here and visit with us for awhile.”
Imagine a Miller Lite man saying that to his Budweiser counterpart.

VISITING THE TRACE

It feels distinctly like a prison, pulling through the glower of wrought iron gates of Buffalo Trace just outside of downtown Frankfort. The landscaping is serene and minimal, the mood quiet. A solitary guard nods visitors inside where the septuagenarian brickwork is hemmed in by a haze of black fungus creeping slowly up the walls. The windows in the storage buildings are small and angular, wide open in the summertime and wafting a tease of bourbon towards the gift shop where a sprawling crowd waits for their turn to explore the distillery grounds. A visiting couple from Vermont stare at the noodling pipe work connecting various distillery buildings. “It’s like a great big factory, isn’t it?” notes the wife.
The distillery, sprawling across 120 acres and abutting a lazy Kentucky River, dates back three centuries with no computers in the still house. Let the wineries have their decorated eves -- a bourbon distillery is a study of perfect function. The windows must be spaced just-so in order to assure proper air circulation for aging, the rickwork of storage buildings extraordinarily strong in order to support 550-pound barrels of product. A Master Distiller’s creative genius will not be found in a tour of his warehouses, but gestating inside the No. 4 char white oak barrels. 
Yet if the Buffalo Trace Distillery’s architecture suggests solemnity, the business ethic itself is anything but. Earning a basket full of medals (50) that would make Michael Phelps blush with shame, the success of Buffalo Trace is balanced on a two-prong philosophy of a willingness to experiment, alongside a commitment to the hard-won traditions that built the brand. 
“I do have a passion for the product, I’m proud of the product we produce, and I’m proud to be part of the industry,” notes Lee. “Experience is the only way to get there [to be a Master Distiller]. You can’t study this in school and you can’t learn it on the internet – this is on-the-job training. I spent at least ten years in training before I was considered a Master Distiller. It takes a lot of skill and attention to detail in order to make a good product.”
Elmer Lee is a slight man, well groomed yet effortlessly casual in the way that Southerners have a knack for. He pauses politely between his answers that echo off the empty corridor of the ballroom area of the Trace. Yet for all his quiet reserve, he cannot repress a burst of boyish enthusiasm when Jimmy Russell strolls in.
Their’s is a teasing way that suggests a friendship of decades. When asked what his favorite bourbons are, Lee proffers his namesake, the Buffalo Trace bourbon, and the Eagle Rare, then lets slip with a sly grin that, “[e]very once in awhile I drink that 101 out of Lawrenceburg (Wild Turkey).” Russell, when asked what he drinks, states his obvious first two choices (Russell’s Reserve and Wild Turkey), but then immediately delves into further explanation. “I want a lot of different flavors in a bourbon. I think both of us like a more a heavy-bodied flavor, and I really enjoy Elmer’s (Elmer T. Lee Bourbon) and Eagle Rare. Over time, my tastes have changed, but then so have the tastes of a younger generation. We find ourselves lightening up some for a younger generation who enjoy a lighter-bodied drink.”

THE KICKIN’ CHICKEN’

Since the first flask of the stuff was passed around a group of hunting buddies, Wild Turkey has quickly become a cultural icon. Bourbon executive Thomas McCarthy brought some unnamed product to a wild turkey hunt in 1940, and the next year the hunting party requested McCarthy bring more of that “wild turkey bourbon” from the year prior.  Thankfully, McCarthy recognized an icon when he drank it and thereafter began marketing the 101 proof  bourbon as “Wild Turkey.” It’s the drink of poets (Bob Dylan mentions it in “Chronicles I”),  writers (a favorite of Gonzo journalist Hunter S. Thompson) and adrenaline junkies like Evel Knievel, reputed to down a shot before each of his feted stunts.    
These days, Wild Turkey is no longer the purview of Southerners the way it once was. Russell explains the brand’s international expansion, and how tastes change. He travels regularly worldwide promoting bourbon and notes that among his travels Australia has to be his favorite. “If I absolutely HAD to leave Lawrenceburg, that is,” he laughs. “Bourbon started really going overseas 15 to 20 years ago, and the perception of it has changed quite a bit, especially in Japan. Twenty years ago, the younger generation’s parents were drinking a lot of scotch and cognacs. But then people didn’t want to drink what their parents drank, and bourbon started to appeal more and more. And now, a lot of people in Japan and China are fascinated by all things American, which obviously includes bourbon. But we do well in Japan, bourbon does. And Japan is putting out some very good whiskies – you can’t tell that Yamazaki from a good single malt scotch.” Lee, though he hasn’t spent as much time in Japan as Russell, also noted with admiration how well Japanese culture has embraced the history and tradition of bourbon. “I couldn’t get over the price, for one,” he notes. “I went over to promote Blantons once, and where it was selling for $45 a bottle here at the time, over there it was somewhere between $100 and $150. But they love it over there, they’ve really embraced bourbon.” 

TRY NEW THINGS….OR DON’T

“I hope to have God on my side, but I must have Kentucky.”
--Abraham Lincoln
Every distiller in Kentucky has a style as unique as Bill Samuel’s Derby outfits. Some prefer an intensely hands-on approach, others rely heavily on their production team. Still others push the boundaries of their bourbon palate into new territories while counterparts may prefer a more traditional route. Each point of view seems to demand respect. Where the Trace regularly tries new flavors and mash mixtures in smaller barrels, releasing these in hard-to-find .375 mL bottles for aficionado’s to try, Turkey maintains a steadfast appreciation for the flavor and brand they first built upon.
The Trace’s experimental barrels are stored alongside the larger, 50-gallon barrels in various spots in the storage houses. While Lee notes that he hasn’t yet tried an experimental batch that’s been properly aged. “[W]e’ve tried about every way you can think of – we’ve used rice, varying the types of wood we use in barrels, sometimes French Oak, sometimes other kinds of oak barrels, anything you can think of. We’re about to release some rum aged in bourbon barrels, which should be interesting.” Currently Buffalo Trace’s bourbon catalogue runs upwards of 15 brands in 28 varieties, in addition to organic vodka and rye whiskey. But more is not necessarily better, at least not if you’re Jimmy Russell. Russell’s full catalogue of four brands of bourbon bottled in three to four different varieties each include Russell’s Reserve, Rare Breed, Wild Turkey and Kentucky Spirit. This more limited catalogue, along with the newly-released American Honey Bourbon Liqueur, seem to suit him just fine. The release of Wild Turkey’s American Honey liqueur inspires more than a few raised eyebrows among self-professed “hard-core” bourbon drinkers. That the same distillery that creates the “Clint Eastwood of Bourbon,” (as one reviewer in Whisky Magazine deemed Wild Turkey), would make a sweetened honey liqueur, seems incongruous at best. But Russell explains American Honey thus: “I don’t think we’ll experiment more. Everything we put out says Wild Turkey. A new generation may change things. I mean, for many, many years Wild Turkey was the only product we had, and Russell’s Reserve and American Honey are both pretty new things for us. We were looking for something a little softer, a little sweeter. Bourbon liqueur fills that gap nicely – it’s great for a cough syrup, and it’s handy in hot toddy’s, bread pudding and pecan pie. I probably had my first taste of bourbon around six months old, in the wintertime when I would start coughing they gave us some bourbon to help the cough. I make jokes now about how when I learned that I liked the taste, I just started coughing all the time (laughs).”
Bourbon’s use as cough medicine ignites a story in Lee, who laughs telling about his grandfather, also involved in the Trace’s bourbon business. Buffalo Trace was one of the only distilleries allowed to maintain bourbon production throughout the Prohibition, a notable distinction in a period that shut down every other distillery and liquor manufacturer in America. However, the Trace’s allowance for making bourbon was specific to “medicinal uses,” cough syrup being a prime market.
Lee explains, “Back in those days, no one could really make bourbon at all, and we were only allowed to conditionally. My grandfather Lee loved bourbon, but his wife wouldn’t allow an alcoholic beverage in the house. So he came up with a plan, and bribed the local moonshiner to drop stick candy into a barrel and sweeten it. He claimed it cleared his throat, helped his mouth, made him feel a great deal better. And every night he would develop an awful cough –  and wouldn’t you know but he had to have a drink of bourbon, for ‘medicinal purposes,’ of course!”

CHANGING THE MARKET

“You know, bourbon drinkers are different these days, there’s a different generation drinking nowadays,” Russell notes. “When I first got involved in this business, most folks you tried to explain bourbon to were of the opinion that whiskey was all whiskey and there’s no difference. But now, people are well-educated. People are on top of the subject, they know more, and they want to know more about what they’re drinking.”
“And we’re trying to change with bourbon drinkers, too,” he continues. “The old saying was that bourbon was a Southern Gentleman’s drink. It used to be that people got off work in the afternoon, went to the back room of a bar, for the places that had bars in Kentucky, and played a little cards and drank a bit. That has changed dramatically. People are sipping it, spending more money on a quality drink. Bourbon is now a national drink. And people identify their personality with what they drink, they identify with a brand. There’s something for everyone, but two different tastes so everyone has something different to drink.”
Both Russell and Lee are passionate in that while they may prefer their own product for sipping purposes, they both promote bourbon as a whole, not as individual brands. It’s an ethic lost on most industries. “What’s good for one of us is good for us all [distillers]. Educating consumers will bring exposure, knowledge about the product. We all want to sell our own products, but we’re in this together. I promote bourbon – I promote Wild Turkey too, but the more we get the word out, the better for us all.”
Lee agrees, noting that there’s enough different types of bourbon to satisfy just about anyone’s palate, and new flavors are being created all the time. A few steadfast rules about a bourbon’s flavor, however, seem to stay the same. Elmer laughs. “Me and Jimmy went to Independent Stave [barrel company] once and did a tasting. And they had wine tasting first, then bourbon after. And these wine people were sniffing their glass, tasting cinnamon and carrot and pear and all these tastes. Me and Jimmy weren’t saying much -- bourbon’s just a lot different from that. Right then Jimmy leans down to me, and says, ‘I don’t know about ya’ll, but we like to keep ours pretty simple – you won’t find any carrots in Wild Turkey.’”