by cowdery » Sat Feb 07, 2009 5:56 pm
I went back through this thread and still stand by everything I wrote in December.
As for the "legend" of Templeton, I have no problem with marketing fluff, which that is. They take a core of something real--that perhaps Templeton was a center of moonshining activity during Prohibition--and build that up into a full mythology. The claims about Al Capone, for example, are made by communities all over the Midwest, even as far away as the Land Between the Lakes region of Kentucky. I've heard those stories about the big black car with Illinois plates coming to pick up the local product about a million times. The historical reality is that the Chicago Outfit was importing whiskey from Canada, as well as distilling its own throughout the Chicago area, particularly in Chicago Heights, and exporting spirits to the rest of the region. Not the other way around.
Like I said, it's a good story and no less credible than the stories told by a lot of other whiskey brands, most of which spin a tale out of a germ of truth, but please don't take them at face value.
I've never said that Templeton isn't a good product. Whoever made it should be proud of it, but its maker is not in Iowa.
Next on my list: Santa Claus and unicorns.