The George A. Dickel Distilling Company
Cascade Hollow, Normandy, Tennessee

This morning we awoke nearly an hour later than we’d planned, upset that the motel had missed a requested wakeup call. Fortunately, before I had a chance to embarrass myself by calling the front desk, Linda remembered that we are now in the Central Time Zone – an hour ahead of our watches! Ten minutes later, and right on schedule, the phone rang.

Today we are going to explore the entire (legal) Tennessee whiskey industry, which consists of only two distillers located less than twenty miles from one another. Our first stop is at George Dickel’s Cascade Hollow distillery just outside the unincorporated village of Normandy, near Tullahoma. Getting to the site involves traveling along several small country back roads, but the George Dickel folks have provided signs to make finding their site quite easy. The winding drive through the Tennessee countryside is really lovely, especially around the Normandy dam and lake area.

Yesterday was a really beautiful day; sunny and not too humid. Today is not quite like that. It started out gloomy and raindrops began falling as we arrived at the distillery. The setting itself is lovely. Set against the hillsides on both sides of the road, the distillery, charcoal making area, and visitor center are clean and attractive. This is partially due to the fact that the entire operation is much newer than most. George Dickel (also known as the Cascade Distillery) has had a fascinating history of moves and changes, and the current plant was built in 1958, although the ruins of the original, pre-prohibition sight is only a couple hundred yards down the road. The visitor center, made to look like an old general store, looks and feels like it was built just last summer – the smell of fresh-cut wood fills the air. The store, run by Nancy Peterson is filled with Dickel-oriented wares and souvenirs, a old-time counter, an operating post office (Dickel, Tennessee, 37388 – although all their correspondence uses Tullahoma as the return address, with the same ZIP code), and small café. As we entered, there were two men having breakfast at one of the handful of tables. Behind the general store is the visitor center, a big, rustic wood, lodge-like room with a fireplace and couches, a little kitchenette-looking area with a TV and VCR for showing the history of George Dickel, and displays of distillery models and Dickel products.

It is from here that the visitor tours start, and this is where we met our tour guide, Sonjia Crutchfield. We were the only people here for the first tour on a Monday morning and we couldn’t have asked for a more personable and knowledgeable guide. Sonjia took us to see all the places the tour normally covers, but she was able (and happy) to spend a lot more time with us at each stop. She pointed out details that showed us clearly how each process is done, and also showed how much she is aware of the way the distillery works – not just what the tour guides are trained to know (remember that when we get to Jack Daniel later on today).

After the tour we returned to the general store where we bought some souvenirs (including the second in what will be a long series of shot glasses) and a bottle of 10-year old Special Reserve. The whisky had to be purchased in a separate, tiny room reserved and unlocked just for that purpose. Unlike the "other" Tennessee distillery, Dickel is not located in a "dry" county, but there are both state and federal restrictions against direct retail liquor sales by manufacturers, either onsite or through retail outlets. From the outset, the Schenley company (who originally rebuilt the distillery) intended to sell souvenir bottles in the gift shop. Those were the familiar powderhorn-shaped bottles now found on Ebay and at yard sales just about everywhere. They obtained special legal permission (T.C.A. §57-3-204) to allow them a retail liquor license, restricted to selling only special souvenir bottlings of their product. By the time we visited, forty years later, that description had been extended to include the Special Reserve (which is not really a souvenir but part of a collection sold in normal retail stores) and no other Dickel products were available. The "store" must be locked up except when selling to a customer (presumably at the end of a tour).

We said goodbye to Sonjia, who gave us a pre-printed sheet of directions from the distillery to Jack Daniel’s location in Lynchburg.