Bob Windy
Robert J. “Bob” Windy was born in November 1961. The Peru, Illinois native grew up in a community defined by manufacturing and river-valley industry, and his family’s history was intertwined with one of the town’s most recognizable landmarks in the vast Westclox factory complex. Windy’s grandfather worked at Westclox, and Windy’s earliest memories include attending family Christmas parties inside the factory. Those childhood experiences rooted the building in his personal history long before he ever imagined placing a distillery there.
Windy eventually developed a second foundation for his future career through fermentation itself. While living in Chicago, he and future business partner Jeff Yosowitz spent years making wine together on weekends. What began as a hobby gradually became a serious study of fermentation. Over more than a decade they experimented with grapes, yeasts, fermentation temperatures, and small-scale production methods, developing the disciplined habits required to turn raw agricultural materials into finished spirits. Their experiments eventually expanded from wine into distillation, beginning with brandy and then moving into other spirits. That progression provided the technical foundation for a commercial distillery.
The partnership that created Star Union Spirits took formal shape on September 15, 2016, when Windy and Yosowitz organized the company and selected the very same Westclox building in Peru as its home. Yosowitz drafted a proposed craft-distilling ordinance for the city, and Peru adopted the new law in November 2016. Renovation of the production space and visitor areas began in January 2017. The effort restored part of the enormous factory complex while preparing it for a new role in Illinois spirits production. When the distillery opened to the public in November 2018, Peru once again had a licensed distillery for the first time in more than a century.
From the beginning, Star Union’s identity rested heavily on whiskey production. The distillery produces a range of American whiskey styles, built around mash bills that reflect Midwestern grain traditions. Among its most distinctive expressions is the distillery’s 75–25 Light Whiskey, a spirit made with a mash bill of 75 percent corn and 25 percent malted barley. Distilled at high proof in the American light-whiskey style and matured in used oak barrels, the whiskey develops a softer oak profile while allowing the underlying grain character to remain prominent. The spirit has become one of the distillery’s signature releases and demonstrates the technical competence of its distillation program.
Star Union’s whiskey production combines traditional fermentation methods with modern craft-distilling control. Windy and his team built the distillery around the philosophy that whiskey requires time, patience, and careful management of both fermentation and barrel aging. The result is a portfolio that includes multiple whiskey expressions alongside the distillery’s other spirits, with whiskey increasingly occupying the central place in the lineup.
The production team expanded in early 2019 when Casey Beall joined Star Union as distiller and production manager. His arrival strengthened the distillery’s operational capacity and supported the continued development of the whiskey program. As production matured, the spirits began earning national recognition. At the 2022 San Francisco World Spirits Competition, Star Union received multiple medals across its portfolio, including honors for its 75–25 Light Whiskey. The award confirmed that the distillery’s whiskey program had reached a level competitive on one of the industry’s most visible judging stages.
Windy also became a visible advocate for the distillery and for the revival of the Westclox complex. Visitors arriving in Peru frequently encounter him explaining both the whiskey and the building itself—how a factory once filled with clocks now houses copper stills and aging barrels. Regional tourism organizations regularly feature Star Union as a destination within Illinois’ Starved Rock Country, where guests can taste the distillery’s whiskey while standing inside one of the region’s most historic industrial spaces.
In January 2026 the distillery faced an unexpected challenge when a fire elsewhere in the Westclox complex forced a temporary closure after smoke entered the tasting room. Inspections and remediation followed, and Star Union soon reopened to visitors. The interruption proved temporary. The stills continued to run, the barrels continued to age, and production resumed.
Today Bob Windy stands as one of the central figures in the modern revival of distilling in the Illinois Valley. By transforming a historic factory into a working distillery and building a serious whiskey program inside it, he restored a tradition the region had not seen in generations. Inside the massive brick walls of the Westclox complex, fermentation tanks, copper stills, and aging barrels now carry forward a new chapter of local history—one measured not in ticking clocks, but in the slow, deliberate passage of whiskey through time.
Sources:
Star Union Spirits official website, “Our Story”, starunionspirits.com
Distillery Trail (blog), “Star Union Spirits Converts c1845 Brewery…”, January 4, 2019, www.distillerytrail.com/blog
American Craft Spirits Association, “Star Union Spirits Launches New Distillery…”, Jeff Yosowitz, December 5, 2018
Illinois Office of Tourism | Enjoy Illinois, “Star Union Spirits”, www.enjoyillinois.com
Illinois Corn Growers Association, “Rooted in Peru, Illinois: Star Union Spirits…”, Tara Desmond, September 11, 2025, www.ilcorn.org
Contributed by Tracy McLemore, Fairview, Tennessee