Luther King
Luther Green King (1825–1909)
In his father’s will, Luther Green King, who was born in 1825, inherited an equal share of 217 acres, just enough to begin a small farm. He was also remanded ownership of two slaves. With these resources, he built the only distillery ever known to exist in Montgomery County, Maryland. The site was near Clarksburg on Burnt Hill Road, just off Price Distillery Road. Since he could easily buy rye grain from nearby growers, distilling may just have been a natural step for Luther at that time in Maryland’s legendary distilling history.
The distillery was a three-story structure, with an office for making sales and a loading dock where horse-drawn wagons could carry away barrels of whiskey. It was a modest operation, probably working in close conjunction with farming interests. The clientele was likely a local one. Collectors of Maryland whiskeys contend that they do not know of a label King-made whiskey bottle or jug. This suggests that Luther sold his stock to saloonkeepers who doled out a drink at a time or filled containers brought in by their customers. Nonetheless, Maryland rye was the drink of choice for most of King’s neighbors, and trade probably was brisk. From time to time, King may even have found himself in competition with his close neighbor, Levi Price. For much of his distilling career, King lived in a small log cabin near the business. His house was three bays by one bay with a small front porch and a foundation of local fieldstone. As he prospered financially, he built a much larger structure, a log house he named “Trouble Enough Indeed.”
Besides whiskey, the great passion in Luther King’s life was music. He lived at a time when every community prided itself on its brass band. Nearby Hyattstown bragged that its ensemble was “not to be excelled by any band in the county.” As a younger man, Luther had learned to play the trombone and was a member of the Clarksburg Band. Subsequently, he formed a musical group of his own, called the Kings Valley Band. It included at least six other members of the King family.
Luther King’s Legacy. The spacious new home was not the only sign of King’s growing prosperity. He was also buying land for farming purposes and came to purchase 176 more acres, 70 of it fertile farmland. His wealth, however, was primarily generated by the distillery. When King died in 1909, he left a substantial estate. The principal item was 49,000 gallons of whiskey in bond, worth a small fortune, and representing five years of product made from 1904 to 1909. Also in his estate were 19 new whiskey barrels, 50 bushels of malt, and 90 bushels of rye. He left “Trouble Enough Indeed” to his third wife, Mary. He willed the land on which the distillery sat to his brother John and the distillery itself to grandson, John R. Lewis, who was the only offspring of his daughter Laura Belle Lewis.
With his passing, whiskey production appears to have ceased almost immediately at Luther King’s beloved distillery. We can speculate that John R. Lewis was unwilling or unable to continue the operation. Today, the distillery site has been reclaimed by nature, covered with scrub trees, vines, and weeds at the southeastern edge of Little Bennett Regional Park. The only indication that it ever existed as an operating distillery is a historical marker erected beside Burnt Hill Road, not far from the intersection of Price Distillery Road.
Contributed by: Joey Bauer, Frederick, Maryland
with support from Bill & Vicki Gallagher, Mid-Atlantic Rye Whiskey Section Editors, Marriottsville, Maryland