Craft Distillery Whiskey Founders
Northern Mountain States
The Mountain States Region includes the States of: Idaho, Montana, Utah and Wyoming
Below are links to Whiskey Founders that have made huge contributions to the growth of the Mountain States Region Whiskey Industry. These may have been historical figures that lived long ago before prohibition or may be living leaders that have advanced the cause of the industry as a whole. Craft Whiskey has now been its own whiskey category for years.
(NOTE: FOUNDERS ARE LISTED IN ALPHABETICAL ORDER)
1
Chad Brown
Pine Bluffs
Chad Brown had been raised with Wyoming connections, but his family had moved west to Nevada, where he had watched his father home-brew beer, until he eventually took up brewing himself. After earning a college degree in business, he went to work for the Nevada Gaming Control Board.
2
Andy Koenig
Koenig Distillery
In 1999 Andy Koenig and his brother Greg formally launched Koenig Distillery & Winery. The company initially produced European-style fruit spirits, a natural starting point given Andy’s Austrian training, but whiskey was already on the horizon, and ten years later, Koenig filled his first bourbon barrels.
3
Brad & Kate Mead
Wyoming Whiskey
An attorney who shares a practice with his wife, Brad Mead is the grandson of former U.S. Senator and Wyoming Governor Clifford Hansen, and the older brother of Wyoming’s current governor, Matt Mead. He once ran for Justice of the Peace, but today, Brad’s happier to talk about Wyoming Whiskey, the distillery he founded with his wife, Kate .
4
Ryan Mongomery
Montgomery Distilling
In 2010, Ryan Montgomery traveled to Scotland to learn distilling fundamentals. He studied under Frank McHardy at Springbank Distillery in Campbeltown, an apprenticeship that offered a philosophy of old-world methods, human attention, and a preference for doing the work with your own hands.
5
Steve Nally
Wyoming Whiskey
Steve Nally was born in Loretto, Kentucky in, 1950. His family farm joined the Maker’s Mark property. As a young boy he roamed the Maker’s property hunting local game or just hiking the hills owned by the Samuels. He attended Loretto High School. After graduation from high school he bought a small farm.
6
David Perkins
High West Distillery
In 2002, David, attended a wedding in Kentucky. On a whim, he visited the Maker’s Mark distillery, where the fermentation and aging processes triggered a profound realization. He later recalled the barrel warehouse bathed in vanilla- and caramel-scented air, and it hit him: “I want to make whiskey.”
7
Dave Pickerell
Many Distilleries
David Steven Pickerell is credited as the founding father of the craft distilling movement and helped shape the modern American distilling industry as we know it. He once had the nickname “The Johnny Appleseed of American Whiskey” for the multitude of distilleries whose development he played a role in.