Elmer T. Lee
“Father of the Single Barrel”
Elmer Tandy Lee was born in August 1919 in Peaks Mill, Franklin County, Kentucky. Lee’s father died of typhoid fever when he was an infant, and he was raised by his mother in Frankfort, graduating from Frankfort High School in 1937. He worked for a while at a local shoe store, then entered the University of Kentucky. Lee withdrew from college after Pearl Harbor to volunteer for the U.S. Army in World War II, where he served as a radar bombardier aboard B-29 bombers based in the Mariana Islands..
Elmer returned home after the war, determined to get his bachelor’s degree in engineering. One day in 1949, he walked into the George T. Stagg Distillery just down the street from his house in Frankfort and asked for a job. The Master Distiller and President of the distillery, Colonel Albert Blanton, told him, “Son, we’re not hiring any hands today.” However, on his way out of the distillery, Lee randomly ran into future Bourbon Hall of Famer Orville Schupp, who implored Lee to come back the following week, and they would find something for him. The following Monday, he was hired on at the plant in maintenance.
In 1950, Elmer T. Lee and Elizabeth “Libby” Dean were married, and about that time, Elmer was promoted to an engineering position, working on and repairing machinery. Then, just ten years into his tenure, he was given another promotion, this time to Plant Superintendent. In 1969, Lee was named the Distillery Manager, and then in 1981, he earned the esteemed title of Master Distiller.
Lee’s introduction of the premium brand of bourbon called Blanton’s in 1984 was widely credited with raising bourbon’s reputation within the spirits industry and helped to reverse a long slump in Kentucky’s signature industry. For Blanton’s Single Barrel, Mr. Lee and his staff selected the best-aged bourbon whiskey from the sweet spot of the warehouse and bottled it straight from the barrels, unblended, in decanters featuring horse-and-jockey bottle stoppers in a salute to Kentucky’s thoroughbred industry. Blanton’s sold for a remarkable $35 a bottle, compared with an average price of $7 to $12 for most other bourbons.
In addition to all the titles Elmer held, he oversaw much of the Distillery’s modernization and growth up until he retired from Buffalo Trace in 1985. Several years after his retirement, Buffalo Trace honored him by naming another Single Barrel Bourbon, “Elmer T. Lee.” Despite being a pensioner, Lee never really left the distillery, and the company named him Master Distiller Emeritus. After that, he made the rounds around the distillery every Tuesday in his trademark golf cap, signing memorabilia along the bottling line for employees and in the gift shop for tourists. He especially loved the visits with his friends in Blanton's Bottling Hall and tasting bourbons in the Buffalo Trace lab.
Elmer T. Lee received the ultimate honor by being only the third individual ever inducted into the inaugural class of the Kentucky Bourbon Hall of Fame in 2001. Elmer T. Lee passed away in Frankfort in July of 2013, just shy of his 94th birthday. “Miss Libby” had preceeded him in death by seven years. As a final tribute to the “Father of the Single Barrel” and the ultimate nod to Lee’s contributions to the Bourbon industry, Buffalo Trace released an Elmer T. Lee Commemorative Edition bourbon in 2013, the same year of his passing.
Contributed by Colonel Craig Duncan, Columbia, Tennessee
Elmer T. Lee was one of three men that saved the Bourbon Industry with his bold contribution of Blanton’s Original Single Barrel Bourbon. Buffalo Trace honored Elmer with his own namesake Elmer T. Lee Single Barrel Bourbon and then came out with a commemorative edition in 2013 in the year of his passing.