OLD HEAVEN HILL

When I was introduced to bourbon, it was a version called Old Heaven Hill Old Style
Bourbon. The name was written in script like letters on a while label. Old Heaven Hill arched
over the top and Old Style Bourbon arched on the bottom of the label. It was 100 proof. I don't
believe it was bonded.

Heaven Hill themselves seems unaware of the existence of this bourbon and I'm wondering if
anyone at straightbourbon knows about it and could find out from Heaven Hill if it's still
available.

JOEW

Sorry, don't mean to inringe on your question but i also had a question about old heaven hill. The only bottling I've seen was gold in color. I don't remember the proof or any age statements but im sure someone here knows what im talking about. Could you give me any idea of the quality of this bottling? It was selling for 6.99 I think, but I'll try not to jump to any conclusions.

John

[cowdery]

This is in reply to both questions. When Heaven Hill was established, right after Prohibition, their business model was to sell the whiskey to distributors as soon as it left the still. Included in the sales agreement was a contract for aging the whiskey on the distributor's behalf and, at the appropriate time, bottling it. Among other things, this approach meant that the distributors were able to specify the age and proof they wanted, and name the whiskey and design the label any way they wanted. Only later did Heaven Hill start to sell whiskey under the Heaven Hill name and other brand names, and even then the distributor could tailor the product as they saw fit. I remember a figure of 2,500 different labels being used at one time for all of the different products (whiskeys and other spirits) sold by Heaven Hill.

That's a long way of saying that a particular Heaven Hill label may only have been sold for a limited time in a limited area, at the behest of a particular distributor. It isn't too surprising that even Heaven Hill can't tell you too much about it. Today, I don't think the Heaven Hill brand is widely distributed at all. I only see it in Kentucky. Most of their whiskey is sold as Evan Williams, Henry McKenna or Elijah Craig. They also still do some private label distilling for distributors, as in the old days.

--Chuck Cowdery

I was in KY the past two weeks, talked to a distributor at a liquor store in Paducah and managed ot order a version of
Heaven Hill that may very well be the one I've been looking for. It had the Old Heaven Hill, Old Style Bourbon title written in
script on the label. The only difference was that it's now in green lettering instead of black as I remember it. It's 100 proof
is six or eight years old (I can't remember).

The key element is that it tastes very good.

JOEW

Just wanted to say that I recently bought a liter of Heaven Hill's Old Style Bourbon -- the 80 proof. It's very, very good -- I now place it (with Evan Williams and Rebel Yell) on my short list of quality value bourbons. How does it taste? Best way I can describe it...imagine Bourbon Deluxe, but a little sweeter and with a very nice, very crisp backbone/finish. Don't know how easy this is to find, but if you spot it, pick it up. I got a liter for about $10 -- a real bargain.

Now I'd really like to try the 100 proof.

doug