Pappy Van Winkle, the world's most coveted bourbon

In a universe filled with major brands, at least one small family liquor business is thriving. Lee Cowan serves up proof positive. Kentucky's limestone water. It's too good not to be used in good bourbon, which may be why there are two barrels of bourbon for every person who lives here. Although in the wake of the election, some of them are likely empty by now. But there is one tale about one bourbon, told in the glow of an autumn evening, that's less about whiskey and more about family and time and not enough of either. This is the home of the Van Winkles, an unassuming family in Louisville, who are as private as they come. If their name wasn't on the bottle, you'd never know. They craft some of the most coveted bourbon in the world. Pappy Van Winkle. Do you remember the first time you tasted it? I do. It had some, but it didn't taste thin and gasolini. I don't have the official word, but it felt like if I poured it over a spoon, it would coat the spoon. That's right, Thompson, senior writer for ESPN, who, like the sports heroes he usually writes about, thought that the lore of the elusive Pappy was worth a book. You get the sense that the bourbon is almost an accidental byproduct of these people just living their lives. And maybe that's why people go so crazy for it. I think you think you know yourself pretty well until someone else starts writing about you. The current keeper of the Van Winkle secret is Julian Van Winkle III. The first one, not so much. Not bad, just different. His son, Preston, has spent nearly a lifetime as his dad's able apprentice. I was younger than the whiskey I was selling when I started working for my dad. Learn all kinds of stuff hanging out with us, Lee. Julian started young, too, fixing leaky barrels for his dad, who learned the craft from his dad, Pappy himself. That is probably the rarest bottle in there. Pappy is so storied, he has his own exhibit at the Fraser History Museum in Louisville. He was just a great old guy. He was very dapper with his little vest on and smoking his cigars. And he's a very unique individual, a real salesman. His sister says that Julian is Pappy made over. I don't see that. Look at the label. That's true. You're turning into him. Pappy used wheat instead of rye in his bourbon recipe, which gave it a smoother, sweeter taste. His vow is still bolted to the distillery that he co-founded on Derby Day in 1935. We make fine bourbon, it reads. At a profit if we can, at a loss if we must. But always fine bourbon. It's what my father and grandfather were always doing was selling aged bourbon whiskey. Really good aged bourbon whiskey. But by the 60s, even the finest bourbons had gone out of favor. They were dinosaurs with a cork. It was like an old man's drink, you know. My grandfather used to drink bourbon, but we sure don't drink that stuff anymore. It's one of those kind of deals. Yeah, I mean, the last time you had bourbon was Kentucky Tavern in college. Like, you know, the difference between this and that is like a hood ornament and a racehorse. I mean, it's just... And yet, there Pappy sat, unwanted. Julian's dad reluctantly sold the family distillery in 1972. Do you think he ever got over selling the distillery? No, I don't think so. No, it pretty much did him in, I think, in the end. It was just, it was his life. I mean, he brought it home every night, so it was a tough deal. He died of prostate cancer just a few years later. Did you feel a pressure to carry on the business, or was it a desire, really? It was the only thing I knew how to do to earn a living, basically. So he started over, from scratch, really, with a beat-up truck and a forlorn distillery that he bought in 1981. He set about honoring something old, even while the beverage world had moved on to something new. Did you ever think about giving up? Nope. We didn't realize what was happening all that time. And he didn't either, honestly. He just knew how to work hard. Julian's daughters, Carrie, Chenault, and Louise, triplets, in case you can't tell. He was always fixing stuff and rolling barrels, and he would come home with a bleeding head or a sprained ankle and have driven home with a bag of ice from the gas station on his ankle. No one paid Pappy much mind until 1997, when the Beverage Testing Institute in Chicago got its hands on some Pappy. It gave it a 99 out of 100, the highest rating ever given to a whiskey. Ever since, Pappy has become one of the most sought-after and expensive bourbons anywhere. Many camped out through the pre-dawn darkness. It's so rare that it's a news event when the few bottles of Pappy are released. I feel like I got the golden ticket. Some stores have even resorted to using a lottery to decide who gets to buy even one bottle. People call them unicorns, and supposedly they're out there, but most people don't see them. Did you always intend to make less than you could sell? Not a good smart move. It would be nice to have more, and we're making more, but the demand keeps going up, so I don't think we'll ever get there. No one knows when bourbon goes into a barrel if it'll make the trip, if angels will drink more than their fair share as it evaporates over the decades. Every now and again, you'll see the word empty. That's just a gut punch. Bad day. But what is left isn't just a family's loved and cared-for whiskey. What Wright Thompson discovered in writing his new book was that the real spirit in a bottle of Pappy isn't its rarity or its price or, frankly, even its taste. A bottle of Pappy is all about those who have gone before us. When you get it now, what you get is a son and a grandson's memory at work. I find that really powerful and moving. For you, this really isn't a book about bourbon at all, is it? It's barely a book about bourbon. It's a lot about what we owe our families and how we can pass the best of them along.