By Tabitha Evans Moore, EDITOR & PUBLISHER

LYNCHBURG, Tenn. — It’s Tuesday afternoon and Jack Daniel Master Distiller Chris Fletcher sits at his desk near the Cave Spring here in The Holler – likely in the same leather-bound chair that his grandfather, Frank Bobo, used while doing the exact same job from 1966-1988. Whiskey, to Fletcher, is literally a family tradition.

I’ve known Chris my entire life. His mother coached my high school cheerleading squad. His sister is married to my cousin. His grandfather and my grandfather were close friends, and I can still recall how Mr. Frank’s entire body would shake but no sound would come out when you told him something really, really funny.

This is how things go in Lynchburg – everything and everyone is connected.

“Innovations make every day feel like Christmas morning.”

Chris is unassuming for someone with so much power over the direction of one of the world’s top-selling whiskey brands. Jack employees shipped over 14 million cases of our local product to all four corners of the world in 2023.

For today’s tasting, Chris wears a simple black golf shirt with an Old No. 7 logo, jeans, and classic, square-framed glasses. He’s warm, personable, and not the kind of person who would ever tell you about his title here in Lynchburg if you didn’t already know.

Today, we’re visiting with Chris to discuss the distillery’s newest innovation, a 14-year-old Tennessee Whiskey distillery officials released on Monday. Even though it hasn’t hit national liquor store shelves just yet, it’s already in high demand. Several cases were available at the White Rabbit Bottle Shop inside the Visitor’s Center here in Lynchburg on Monday and they sold out before noon.

As media, I received a small bottle of both the new 14-year-old as well as Jack Daniel’s 10-Year Old Tennessee Whiskey Batch 4, and Jack Daniel’s 12-Year Old Tennessee Whiskey Batch 3 on Monday and I’ve been dying to open them.

As Chris begins talking about the innovations pipeline here at the Distillery, his eyes light up. As a chemist whose only ever made whiskey, Chris says innovations like the age-stated series make coming into the office every day feel like Christmas morning.

“The American whiskey industry has evolved, especially over the last 15 years, and I love that we’re able to really dig in and innovate to show the world what our team can do here in Lynchburg.”

Exact same whiskey DNA

There is no recipe card stored in a vault somewhere in Lynchburg – just a whiskey-making process that gets handed down from one generation to the next.  Local distillers may play around with how many feet of maple charcoal it mellows through, the barrel, the barrel’s position in a local rickhouse, or how long said barrels age, but almost every bottle of whiskey coming out of Lynchburg comes from the exact same whiskey DNA.

That DNA begins with the same grain bill of 80 percent corn, 12 percent malted barley, and eight percent rye that won Jasper “Jack” Daniel his first International Gold Medal back in 1904.

“We use the malted barley for the conversion of starches in the grains to fermentable sugars,” Chris explains. “That’s really important for us. Breaking down those starches in the mashing process feeds the yeast.”

That yeast – or Mother Culture, as they call it – is the other strand of the whiskey double helix. It dates all the way back to Prohibition time.  You can draw a single line from Jack’s yeast to the one Chris Fletcher uses today. Back then, they used to store it in the cave spring to keep it cool. Today, it’s safely stored in a lab, and each week, Jack Daniel’s in-house microbiologist grows fresh yeast for that week’s production.

“It’s hard for me to overstate the importance of the yeast and the fact that we handle that piece ourselves,” Chris says. “In my opinion, probably the biggest differentiator of flavor for our whiskey is that yeast. Those fruity notes that you get … the big apricot, apple peel, banana notes … in an Old No. 7 or a Gentleman Jack, come from that yeast.”

“Doing right by the whiskey.”

Like most small towns, time is a precious thing here in Lynchburg. In the time it’s taken to age this 14-year-old Tennessee Whiskey, 14 different Raider football teams have taken their shot at bringing a Class1A State Championship title back to the Moore County High School trophy case. Dozens of obituaries have run in the local newspaper, and even more babies have been born.

This bottle represents not only the ingenuity of Chris and his staff but also the hard work of the local warehousing crews responsible for moving hundreds and sometimes thousands of barrels during the aging process. And it can be a dangerous game both literally and figuratively.

Jack Daniel Barrel Houses are not temperature controlled. They get frigid cold in the winter and stifling hot in the summer – especially on the top floors. According to Chris, barrels stored on the top floor are the most likely to get picked for age-stated projects because the high heat forces the whiskey in and out of the barrel – resulting in a smoother whiskey. Leave it too long though, and the whiskey can taste bitter and ashy with too much barrel flavor.

“It’s like cooking a steak,” Chris says. “The top floor is like searing a steak to lock in the flavor. Moving it to a lower floor is letting it slowly simmer.”

Lynchburg angels can also be thirsty and barrels on top floors tend to evaporate more – leading to higher proofs. This 14-year-old tested at 130 proof before being moved to a lower floor. It finished at 126.

“Originally, we started holding back different barrels somewhat randomly, to be honest,” Chris says. “Once they get around somewhere between seven and nine years old, we start to look at them on that top floor. You know, we want to make sure that we’re doing right by the whiskey, but that’s a big ask.”

This means in addition to pulling around 2,000 barrels a day for routine production, local warehousing crews need to find extra time to relocate another 1,000-2,000 barrels to the bottom floor of a different barrel house where they’ll age a tad more slowly.

“It might not make me many friends down in the warehousing department,” Chris jokes. “But it’s the right thing to do.”

“A cigar covered in molasses”

The new 14-year-old Tennessee Whiskey was bottled at barrel strength. It’s a big, bold whiskey at 126.3 proof – but it sips like something much lower proof, which could be dangerous.

Smelling it in the glass reminds me of the musty, dusty, dry oak smells you notice when walking into one of the original barrel houses located up on Tanyard Hill. Chris refers to it as “barrel house funk,” which earns him grimace from his PR team. As a local, I’m not offended. It smells like home.

I also get dark fermented fruit and a little tobacco when I stick my nose in the glass.

As I mentioned, the 14-year-old is bold yet very smooth. The first sip reminds me of something semi-sweet like cocoa powder or dark chocolate. The back end reminds me of oak or an old library book. Chris calls the combination a “cigar covered in molasses” and he’s not wrong.

Though you could absolutely drink this whiskey neat, a splash of water or a single ice cube really opens it up. The confectionary notes in it would also lend themselves to a perfect Old Fashioned.

As the tasting ends, I stealthily stash my sample in my messenger bag. I’ve been invited to watch the Tennessee, Alabama men’s basketball game with friends on Saturday. This small sample will make me the belle of the ball, so to speak. If the gal from Lynchburg can’t be counted on to bring the good whiskey, who can, right?

According to the press release, all three new whiskeys will be available this month on local shelves and across the U.S. in limited quantities. Additionally, Jack Daniel’s 10-Year-Old Tennessee Whiskey will be available in select countries internationally beginning this summer.

The 14-year-old’s suggested retail price is $149.99 for a 700 mL bottle, but the secondary and collector’s market already lists bottles for over double that at press time. The 12-year-old will retail for $94.99, and the 10-year-old will retail for $84.99.

Towards the end of our time together, Chris hints at future projects. He’s excited to try and push the age-stated line out farther. He also says he loves the idea of re-creating age-stated whiskeys that Jack might have bottled while he was alive.

“Twenty-one years is the oldest number I’ve ever seen on a historical bottle of Jack Daniel’s” he says. “So that’s kind of the goal … to release new bottles of all these age-stated whiskeys each year. The richness, and the amount of sweetness in this 14-year-old make me very optimistic.” •

{Published since 2019, The Lynchburg Times is owned, published, edited, and reported by a Lynchburg native with over 20 years of journalism experience. It’s also one of the few women-owned newspapers in the state. We’re supported by both readers and community partners who believe in independent journalism for the common good. You can support us by clicking here. }