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Jack Daniel’s Embraces a Hidden Ingredient: Help From a Slave

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I was more referring to this line:

Despite the recent attention from Jack Daniel’s, Nearis Green’s name is just a faint echo, even among several of his descendants who live in the area. Claude Eady, 91, who worked for the distillery from 1946 to 1989, said he was related to Green “on my mother’s side,” but didn’t know much about him.

Even if there were super detailed accounts somewhere of him teaching Jack Daniels via spoken word and written instruction, even his descendants know his name only in passing.

Of course not, he was a slave. How many African Americans know the names of their slave descendants? Hence the reason it's important to give people the proper recognition and compensation for their work and for history's sake.
 
So you're saying there's no truth to this? I was using reparation specifically in this case, and not the US as a whole though that's whole other discussion.

Whiskey in the south didn't get a real start until the early 1800s when Pennsylvania whiskey producers (those Germans and Scots-Irish) moved south after the Whiskey Rebellion. By that time most of the distilling technique was already well established, as was the barreling process. The grain mash changed from rye to corn, and that's how bourbon came about. It's not as if it was a process that was created by slaves and co-opted by slave owners. There may have been certain techniques that slaves used that were brought into the whiskey making process, such as the Lincoln County Process. I'm not going to debate reparations or anything like that though.
 
Whiskey in the south didn't get a real start until the early 1800s when Pennsylvania whiskey producers (those Germans and Scots-Irish) moved south after the Whiskey Rebellion. By that time most of the distilling technique was already well established, as was the barreling process. The grain mash changed from rye to corn, and that's how bourbon came about. It's not as if it was a process that was created by slaves and co-opted by slave owners. There may have been certain techniques that slaves used that were brought into the whiskey making process, such as the Lincoln County Process. I'm not going to debate reparations or anything like that though.

What does this specifically have to do with the case of Nearis Green and Jack Daniel's whiskey?
 

NH Apache

Banned
Agreed, I'll use owed royalties and recognition in this case. Come to think about it from a marketing standpoint, I don't see why Jack Daniel's couldn't create a Nearis Green line of whiskey and promote to an "urban" demographic with the proceeds going to Green descendants.

Recognition he seems to be getting. I'm not sure where you're getting royalties out of this? Do you give a cut of your earnings to your teachers?
 
What does this specifically have to do with the case of Nearis Green and Jack Daniel's whiskey?

Nearis Green didn't invent the distilling process. He was likely taught the distilling process from whiskey producers that moved to the area after the Whiskey Rebellion. You can be the best distiller in an area and not be the inventor of the process. Maybe he refined it and made it better. I don't know. I do know whiskey was being produced long before it got to that region. Do you factor that in to your decision to pay reparations? I don't really know how that all works nor do I want to participate in such a debate.
 

Zakalwe

Banned
Agreed, I'll use owed royalties and recognition in this case. Come to think about it from a marketing standpoint, I don't see why Jack Daniel's couldn't create a Nearis Green line of whiskey and promote to an "urban" demographic with the proceeds going to Green descendants.

That would be an excellent outcome. I'm sure they could afford it, and it would be great promotion while making their deceleration of this truth actually mean something.

It's a shame it almost certainly won't happen, though.
 

Palmer_v1

Member
For the record, I'm not saying that Jack Daniels actually owes the Green family in any legal way.

Morally? There's a debt that could be paid here.
 
Recognition he seems to be getting. I'm not sure where you're getting royalties out of this? Do you give a cut of your earnings to your teachers?

The teacher was a slave. Do you realize he couldn't open his own business and capitalize on his creations, but could only work and make his master's money.
 

HStallion

Now what's the next step in your master plan?
Recognition he seems to be getting. I'm not sure where you're getting royalties out of this? Do you give a cut of your earnings to your teachers?

Yeah they just waited a 150 years to do it in a shitty PR move. Really great recognition.
 
Nearis Green didn't invent the distilling process. He was likely taught the distilling process from whiskey producers that moved to the area after the Whiskey Rebellion. You can be the best distiller in an area and not be the inventor of the process. Maybe he refined it and made it better. I don't know. I do know whiskey was being produced long before it got to that region. Do you factor that in to your decision to pay reparations? I don't really know how that all works nor do I want to participate in such a debate.

WTF. Who ever argued any of this?
 

NH Apache

Banned
The teacher was a slave. Do you realize he couldn't open his own business and capitalize on his creations, but could only work and make his master's money.

Apparently, his sons worked for Daniels. I don't know Green's terms with Call, but yes, I generally understand how slavery worked.

Edit: Removed because I don't want to delve into it.
 
WTF. Who ever argued any of this?

I thought you were arguing that Jack Daniel's should owe reparations due to the fact that Nearis Green taught the process to Daniel. It's not as if this was uncommon knowledge at the time, and it's not as if Nearis Green wouldn't have been taught himself by another. I thought that was valid information to provide to your discussion.
 
Apparently, his sons worked for Daniels. I don't know Green's terms with Call, but yes, I generally understand how slavery worked.

Green didn't invent the process, as stated above by other posters. Reparations almost imply some legal requirement to pay money back; in this case, were it to happen, I believe a moral argument could be made but not a legal one.

Nobody is arguing Green invented the process. What I am arguing is Green, as a slave, played a significant contribution specifically in teaching Jack Daniel "Everything he knew" (A direct quote form Cal, the actual slave master) which later became the best selling whiskey.

I thought you were arguing that Jack Daniel's should owe reparations due to the fact that Nearis Green taught the process to Daniel. It's not as if this was uncommon knowledge at the time, and it's not as if Nearis Green wouldn't have been taught himself by another. I thought that was valid information to provide to your discussion.

Are you suggesting that the African slaves didn't infuse their own traditions and innovations within the European process? Or that processes can't be based on a singular foundation, while have different things added to it in order to make it unique as with any recipe?
 

Volimar

Member
AHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA


All those ignorant racists have been drinking a black man's whiskey.


AHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAAHAHAHA
 
Are you suggesting that the African slaves didn't infuse their own traditions and innovations within the European process? Or that processes can't be based on a singular foundation, while have different things added to it in order to make it unique as with any recipe?

I didn't say that. In the case of American Rye whiskey that is unlikely. In the case of Bourbon it's highly likely. In the case of Jack Daniel's/Tennessee whiskey it's likely that the use of charcoal chips to filter whiskey has origins with the slave community. I'm all for acknowledging that contribution and I think it's very interesting, especially as someone who is a big whiskey enthusiast.
 
I didn't say that. In the case of American Rye whiskey that is unlikely. In the case of Bourbon it's highly likely. In the case of Jack Daniel's/Tennessee whiskey it's likely that the use of charcoal chips to filter whiskey has origins with the slave community. I'm all for acknowledging that contribution and I think it's very interesting, especially as someone who is a big whiskey enthusiast.

Agreed, then why are we beefing? LOL :)
 
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