H. E. Pogue Distillery

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H. E. Pogue Distillery

Unread postby zac » Tue Dec 08, 2009 10:59 am

This is my first post here. I am a bourbon drinker so my wife pulled an old bottle from an abandoned house. I have tried to research it but have found little information. Here is as much info from th bottle as I have.

"Old Time brand fine kentucky bourbon"

H. E. Pogue Distillery Co. Inc.
Maysville Kentucky

There is a stamp on it that is damaged but here is the info that is left on it;
State of Wisconsin occupational tax on intoxicating liqours 25 cents treasury dept beverage tax division

I saw something that suggested the distillery was closed in 1940 but that is all I have heard about it.

Thanks for any info you can give me
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Re: H. E. Pogue Distillery

Unread postby zac » Tue Dec 08, 2009 9:16 pm

I would like to put pictures on here but I am a little computer illiterate. I got the pictures on the computer but I can;t figure out how to get them on this page
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Re: H. E. Pogue Distillery

Unread postby enzo » Tue Dec 08, 2009 9:50 pm

zac,

go to http://imageshack.us/

Click the browse button, and navigate to the photos on your computer and select one.
Then click start upload. It will upload and give you a direct link to that image.
Select and copy that link. It will look something like this: http://img31.imageshack.us/img31/3011/picture4zp.jpg

To post an image on the bourbonenthusiast forums, click Reply, then the img button:
Image

then paste the link from imageshack between the 2 img brackets:
Image

should look something like this:
Image

Hope that helps.
Too much of anything is bad, but too much of good whiskey is barely enough.
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Re: H. E. Pogue Distillery

Unread postby cowdery » Wed Dec 09, 2009 2:48 pm

The Pogue distillery was in Maysville, Kentucky, which is in northeastern Kentucky on the Ohio River. The town was originally called Limestone. If I remember correctly, the Pogue distillery didn't come back after Prohibition. It's possible that the Pogue brand was revived after Prohibition even if the distillery was not.

A few years ago, some modern descendants of the family revived the brand and even acquired the old family homestead, but they are a non-distiller producer.
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Re: H. E. Pogue Distillery

Unread postby zac » Sun Dec 13, 2009 2:29 pm

Pictures

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Re: H. E. Pogue Distillery

Unread postby enzo » Sun Dec 13, 2009 9:09 pm

Wow! Very Cool :)
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Re: H. E. Pogue Distillery

Unread postby zac » Mon Dec 14, 2009 9:22 pm

For those of you who are interested Peter Pogue from oldpogue.com replied to my email witht he following.

Zac: Thanks for your email. The bottle you have was made post prohibition probably around 1934 and bottled in 1940 or so. We have a few of these bottles ourselves and actually opened one about a month ago and we were surprised by the bourbon's smoothness after all these years. While our family was still involved in the distillery post prohibition it was owned by National Distillers which then became Schenley. The distillery closed in the early 1950s. As the post on bourbonenthusiast.com says our family has brought back one brand of the product in the last several years. Let us know if you have any more questions you need answered. Peter Pogue

Pretty cool I thought. I wonder if this was on the top shelf back in 1940. It has evaporated down quite a bit. Is that very detremental. I guess i'll have to open it and see. Don't know much about what. Now I just have to wait for something really cool to happen so I can open it.
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Re: H. E. Pogue Distillery

Unread postby enzo » Wed Dec 16, 2009 12:43 am

Fantastic find Zac :)

Looking forward to your tasting notes when you crack it open!

Wish I had such an opportunity.
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Re: H. E. Pogue Distillery

Unread postby EllenJ » Sun Dec 20, 2009 5:11 pm

cowdery wrote:The Pogue distillery was in Maysville, Kentucky, which is in northeastern Kentucky on the Ohio River. The town was originally called Limestone.

An interesting tidbit I've heard, but haven't been able to confirm...
Limestone was THE major shipping point for whiskey made in the Frankfort/Lawrenceburg/Lexington part of Kentucky (I don't know why the Kentucky River to the Ohio at Carrollton wasn't the preferred route; maybe the Kentucky was difficult to navigate?). One of the earliest overland roads anywhere west of the mountains ran from there to Frankfort. Anyway, according to what I've heard, the name "Maysville" wasn't always spelled that way; it was originally called "Maizeville", because of all the corn (and corn products, such as whiskey) that moved through there. I don't know if that's a true story (I didn't make it up myself), but it sounds both romantic and logical, and that's about as authentic as anything else you're likely to learn about bourbon history :D
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Re: H. E. Pogue Distillery

Unread postby cowdery » Thu Dec 31, 2009 6:52 pm

While our family was still involved in the distillery post prohibition it was owned by National Distillers which then became Schenley.


Maybe National sold the Pogue Distillery to Schenley, but National never 'became' Schenley. They were two distinct companies. National was eventually merged with Jim Beam and Schenley was one of the components of what is now Diageo.
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Re: H. E. Pogue Distillery

Unread postby zac » Thu Jan 21, 2010 1:03 am

Well i thought that I should let you guys know how it tastes. I should preface this by saying that I might not have the most sophisticated pallet. To me it seemed like this tasted old. I tasted like some old clothes that have been in the attic for a long time. Some of that may have been a corky taste. Aside from the very old taste the alcohol seemed to have a chemically taste to it. I imagine that oxygen took it's toll on it over 70 years.
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Re: H. E. Pogue Distillery

Unread postby gauze » Fri Jan 22, 2010 9:09 am

zac wrote:Well i thought that I should let you guys know how it tastes. I should preface this by saying that I might not have the most sophisticated pallet. To me it seemed like this tasted old. I tasted like some old clothes that have been in the attic for a long time. Some of that may have been a corky taste. Aside from the very old taste the alcohol seemed to have a chemically taste to it. I imagine that oxygen took it's toll on it over 70 years.


mmm musty chemicals.
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Re: H. E. Pogue Distillery

Unread postby sailor22 » Fri Jan 22, 2010 12:23 pm

It isn't unusual for an old bottle to have a corkey taste. It's a let down isn't it?
Sometimes a few drops of spring water and 5 or 10 min of swirling in an open rocks style glass will open it up somewhat. Give that a try a see if you can't pick up more flavors. Another trick is to add a few drops of some more current juice and see if that helps. I always use something as similar to the anticipated taste as I can. I don't know what you would use for the Pogue.
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