by ggilbertva » Wed Sep 15, 2010 1:17 pm
Based on the pictures, I would venture a guess of mid 80's bottling. The faux tax strip along with the lack of Gov't warning on the back of the bottle drives my guess. If you flip the bottle upside down and look for a two digit date (usually in the lower right corner), that number denotes the year the bottle was manufactured which is a good indicator of when the bourbon went into the bottle. Therefore, if your bourbon is 4 years old and was bottled in 1985, that would place distillation around '81. Not an exact science but at least gives you a loose indicator of bottling year.