The Time Capsule | Roy Marshall

There’s not a bottle of Old Overholt to be found in Montgomery County. Despite medicinal benefits, there apparently isn’t one in Cass or Page either. 

Thirty years have passed since my only sip of the rye first distilled by Abraham Overholt (1784-1870), so I’ve demonstrated an ability to do without. My interest in re-testing the original was stirred by recent news stories about Templeton Rye. 

Templeton producers were charged with misleading advertising, mostly because they claimed to make small-batch whiskey in Iowa using a family recipe from the Prohibition era. This was potentially deceptive, as their rye is distilled in Indiana and shipped to Templeton for bottling. An out-of-court settlement was reached and, as I read it, those with receipts are entitled to a $6 refund. 

I doubt many private buyers saved their receipt (it’s not deductible, is it?), and the settlement is not a serious setback. Templeton is looking to future expansion and building a $26 million distillery. 

Old Overholt’s best days may be in the past. Booze historians tell us the original rye was aged for at least eight years and bonded at a barrel-strength 127 proof. Overholt was turning out only 12 gallons of a day in the 1820s. OO is now owned by a mega-company in Japan, the whiskey a watered-down 80 proof that’s just three years old. Although Abraham Overholt might not soak his false teeth in today’s version, the basic recipe is reputed to be the same. 

America’s oldest commercially produced whiskey has a history. Saloons of the west had rotgut; the good stuff was Old Overholt. It was the choice of Doc Holliday, Johnny Ringo and other discriminating lushes. When President Lincoln said he wished all his generals were drinking whatever U.S. Grant was drinking, the sales of Old Overholt probably increased. This was Grant’s favorite and, according to “Whiskeys fit for a President,” a Fox Food & Drink feature, when Lincoln kicked back he did so with a splash of Old Overholt. 

With the enactment of federal prohibition, breweries and distilleries struggled and many went out of business. Controlling interest in OO was then held by Andrew Mellon, who was also U.S. Secretary of the Treasury. Mellon was a conservative Republican, therefore his position in government had nothing to do with the fact that Old Overholt was issued permits to sell their rye to druggists for medicinal purposes. Overholt’s medicinal superiority was good for the company, and led indirectly to my brief encounter. 

During Prohibition, my wife’s Uncle Ollie (Oliver), then a teen-ager, worked in a Council Bluffs drug store. Whether there was an illness in the family or Ollie was just taking precautions we don’t know, but he stockpiled OO. Later, during the Depression, he took to the road and pretty much dropped out of sight. In the basement of his parent’s home, he left a case of Old Overholt. Over the years it dwindled away. The sip I had was probably from the last bottle, passed around during a Thanksgiving dinner in the late 1980s.

This was the genuine, rare, old, very old, 70-year-old Old Overholt. Experts refer to Overholt’s “creamy nose, grain bites, sweet cereal overtones and the driest, crispest finish of its genre.” 

That’s not exactly the way I remember it. What I remember is needing water and looking at the piercing eyes and disapproving face of Abraham Overholt. OO does not have the friendliest of labels. 

News about Templeton Rye brought back the moment, and I thought of Ollie, who probably learned a lot while working in a drug store. It seemed wise to have a bottle of Overholt on hand before flu season leaves us. Failing to find it in Red Oak, I used an on-line locater and learned the nearest place that carries the stuff is in Council Bluffs. I don’t want it that bad. Templeton costs more than I’ll pay, so we’ll disinfect our grocery carts and hope for the best. 

 

Roy Marshall is a local historian and columnist for the Red Oak Express. He can be contacted at news@redoakexpress.com.

 

The Red Oak Express

2012 Commerce Drive
P.O. Box 377
Red Oak, IA 51566
Phone: 712-623-2566 Fax: 712-623-2568

Comment Here