BourbonEnthusiast.com

Mike wrote:...John says, one must read this forum as mostly opinion and speculative and, it is not primary material on the history of whiskey

Mike, two things:

First, I hope what I said about multiple opinions on a forum like this one didn't overshadow my point that, given that the researcher takes the time to understand our interactions, I think of this as the PREFERRED information source.

Mike wrote:It has been said that to really know America, you must know baseball. I would add that to really know America you must know the story of whiskey here. It is extremely revealing of American character...

And second, you have an uncanny ability to find the same metaphors in unrelated (on the surface, anyway) subjects as I do.
Check this link: http://www.ellenjaye.com/eastpa.htm

John,
I agree with what you are saying about misinformation. A trained historian knows that your information is only as good as your sources. Primary sources are the best information and secondary sources start getting weaker to where they can boarder on the useless. It is not so much what people are saying here that I think the future historians will find interesting but the fact that they exist and are being used. The use of these forums can have an impact on other matters.

For example, Howie jokingly blames me for the high price of Stitzel-Weller, Van Winkle made Old Fitzgerald on ebay, stating I started talking about it to much on the forums. If this were true, then it would reflect an impact on the market of that particular bourbon. Now Howie's statement is not accurate - Julain's products had more to do with it than I did, I guarantee that - but it would show the impact of forums on bourbon markets. I am sure that it is true that what is said at sites like this does have some impact. Just look at how many people read the reviews here and then go buy a bottle based upon the reviews. I know of several people who are not members and would never bother to become a member of a forum, but they do read the reviews here when looking for a new bourbon to try.

I think that all three types of websites play a role in the marketing and sales of bourbon and will continue to do so. I am just curious as to how important each type of site plays in the overall scheme of things.

Hi there.

I'd say that for me, the most important resources on the net for whiskey are:

1) Access to academic journals, historical books, newspapers, etc. Some of these require a trip to your local university library's computer, but the stuff available is absolutely amazing and gives you a whole new perspective on American whiskey.

2) The rest of the net at large. Beer brewers, home distillers, grist mill enthusiasts, sourdough fiends, historical groups of all sorts, geneaologists, and all kinds of other people fill in the gaps and teach you things you wouldn't otherwise learn about.

I think this kind of information was always out there... it was the rise of the search engine that made it available.

My life has been thrown into chaos lately (new job, moved, first kid), but if I ever get some free time (ha ha), I'll be starting a blog to discuss all the crap on my hard drive that I've downloaded over the years. I think there are many many books yet to be written on American whiskey, especially pre-industrial and early industrial whiskey. Probably a few master's and doctoral theses to be written, too.

Tim Dellinger

Stay and play with us tim, you obviously have stuff that needs to find its way out of you. Welcome!

Tim, great to hear from you again!
And that's easily the best answer so far on this thread. Thanks!
And do stay around.