On a recent trip to England, when told we were from Tennessee, our Uber driver beamed, “Elvis and Jack Daniels!” Worldwide, those two names are synonymous with our state. But before the rise of Jack Daniels, there was a much more well-known and predominant Tennessee Sour Mash label — Cascade Whisky, “Mellow as Moonlight.” By 1909, the Cascade Whisky Distillery had become so prominent that, when seized by the Federal Government, it was the largest seizure of any kind in history. Newspapers around the country, covering the seizure, declared the distillery as “the most valuable property of the kind in the state.” From ‘05-‘09, the distillery’s tax burden was $34 million in today’s dollars — 25 percent of all taxes paid by distilleries in Middle and West Tennessee combined. But how and why did Cascade become so prominent, and what happened to it?
The story of Cascade Whisky, distilled near the tiny hamlet of Normandy a few miles from Tullahoma in Coffee County, is a rich one. During the war, Confederate General Bragg, stationed in the area, issued Order No. 146, outlawing consumption of grain by distillation. There were so many distilleries near Tullahoma that grain for the troops had become scarce.
It is assumed that during the war there was an active distillery at the site of Cascade Hollow — future sales of the property included a distillery. The site switched hands several times until in 1883, McLin (Kie) Davis partnered with Matthew Simms and F.E. Cunningham to purchase the 300 acre parcel for $4,400. Davis was the distiller from 1883 until his death in 1898, a master whose product, due to its exceptional quality, almost immediately became known as “the famous Cascade whisky.” In 1888, George A. Dickel Co. became officially involved when its future owner, V. E. “Manny” Shwab, purchased adjacent property, increasing the acreage to 600 and securing 2/3 of the distillery in his own name. The Dickel company became the whisky’s sole distributor. It is assumed that Shwab’s initial interest in Cascade Hollow came from his family’s significant civil war smuggling activities and their identification of the product as superior.
Distiller Davis is credited with several innovations, but the most marketed was his insistence that cooling the mash by moonlight gave the whisky its distinctive mellowness. “Mellow as Moonlight” became the catchphrase printed on every label. The Cascade name originated from an 80 foot waterfall; its water filtered through limestone which, it was said, cleared out the iron resulting in a pure water perfect for whiskey distillation. In addition to the pellucid water and cooling the mash in moonlight, to achieve the desired results, Davis only used maple wood charcoal produced in the open air. Most distillers were using kiln-made charcoal, containing creosote and wood extract contaminates. Cascade’s reputation as the most mellow of the Tennessee whiskies lead Shwab to insist it be labeled “whisky”, without the “e”’ as did the Scots whose whisky had a superior reputation to Irish and other whiskies. An 1889 Nashville Banner article declared, “Whisky made by this distillery is unsurpassed in quality by any made anywhere else.”
To achieve a worldwide audience, around 1906 Shwab engaged the newly founded D’Arcy ad agency. Cascade and Coca Cola became two of the agency’s earliest and largest clients. The whisky’s acclaim grew further as a result of WWI soldiers passing through Nashville on their way to San Francisco, prior to deployment to the Philippines. Cascade became the city’s most popular whisky.
Prohibition loomed. Cascade moved to Louisville — Kentucky being one of the last states to shut down distilling. Shwab’s two sons oversaw production until the end. The famous Kentucky distiller Pappy Van Winkle (Van Winkle bourbon being sold today for over $1,000), declared of Cascade, “it’s like hasn’t been seen since prohibition.” Cascade and the Dickel company had enriched the Shwab family to the point that, post prohibition, in a 1937 meeting in Buist Shwab’s Jackson Boulevard home, it was decided that the liquor business was just not “socially acceptable” enough to re-start. They sold the company and name to Schenley Industries who, unfortunately, produced an inferior product, opening the door for Jack Daniels. Who knows, if the Shwab’s had maintained control, perhaps British Uber drivers would be declaring, “Elvis and Cascade Whisky!”