One of the most well-known brands in the world was created, in part, by a slave.

One of the most well-known brands in the world was created, in part, by a slave.

Uncle Nearest, as he was fondly called by family and friends grew up in Lynchburg, Tennessee, and began working on the farm of a country preacher and distiller in Lincoln County around the mid-1800s. It was there that he learned the skill of distilling and specialized in a process of distillation known as sugar maple charcoal filtering which was also called the Lincoln County Process.

Nearest was such a skilled distiller in the process he specialized in but he kept working with the preacher in the Lincoln County and fortunately it was there that Jack Daniels met him.

In the mid-1850s, Jack Daniels who was just a young white boy from a large family and who also lost his mother to a sudden illness at the age of four months began working as a chore boy for the preacher whom Uncle Nearest worked for.

It is said that Jack Daniels was a curious young boy who kept asking about the smoke coming up through the hollow on the 338-acre property and why men kept hurrying back and forth from that area which he was never allowed to go with mules and wagons.

 Following the civil war and after Nearest was made a free man the young white boy who was then a grown man partnered with the preacher in the distillery, eventually bought the preacher’s shares in the distillery and renamed the distillery after himself.

 following the civil war and after Nearest was made a free man the young white boy who was then a grown man partnered with the preacher in the distillery, eventually bought the preacher’s shares in the distillery and renamed the distillery after himself.

The Recipe For Jack Daniel’s Whiskey Was Invented By A Black Man Named Nathan “Nearest” Nathan “Nearest” Green was the first African American head distiller on record in the United States.

This version of the story was never a secret, but it is one that the distillery has only recently begun to embrace, tentatively, in some of its tours, and in a social media and marketing campaign this summer.

“It’s taken something like the anniversary for us to start to talk about ourselves,” said Nelson Eddy, Jack Daniel’s in-house historian.