Distillers form perfect marriage with Whiskey Rebellion Festival
Whiskey Rebellion re-enactor Joe Pisczor of Washington, left, helps tar and feather Rob Hough during Saturday’s Whiskey Rebellion Festival in Washington.
Woodville Plantation re-enactors, from left, Dave Frankowski, Don Ragaller and Rob Windhorst march in the community parade during the Whiskey Rebellion Festival in Washington.
Woodville Plantation re-enactors, from left, Dave Frankowski, Don Ragaller and Rob Windhorst fire their weapons Saturday while marching in the community parade during the Whiskey Rebellion Festival in Washington.
Whiskey Rebellion Re-enactor Jason Dille gives a speech Saturday during a skit titled “The Firebrand” during the Whiskey Rebellion Festival Saturday in Washington.
Mackenzie Randall/Observer-Reporter A bottle of Basset Town Whiskey from Liberty Pole Spirits on W. Maiden St. is shown Saturday in Washington.
Whiskey Rebellion Re-enactor Clay Kilgore, standing center, pours tar on Rob Hough, kneeling center, during the Whiskey Rebellion Festival Saturday in Washington.
There was a decree in the late 18th century, which prevented farmers in Southwestern Pennsylvania from using corn or wheat to produce whiskey, reserving those grains for breadmaking.
The order forced the mostly Scotch-Irish immigrants in the area to turn to rye to produce their whiskey, said Ellen Hough, an owner of Liberty Pole Spirits on East Maiden Street in Washington.
“The Scotch-Irish really knew how to distill,” Hough said Saturday while her business sold a David Bradford Louisiana Punch cocktail around the block at the annual Whiskey Rebellion Festival.
She and another Washington rye whiskey producer, Ed Belfoure of Red Pump Spirits on Main Street, both agreed the popular festival honoring the nation’s first tax revolt is a perfect marriage of sorts to their businesses.
“There are so many craft distillers, but we are distilled on the exact same spot where the rebellion happened,” said Hough of Cecil Township. “It’s my competitive edge.”
The farmers in the 1790s came to this region in opposition to unfair taxes in their homelands. Needless to say, they became furious after the nation’s first secretary of the treasury, Alexander Hamilton, imposed a tax on rye whiskey to pay down the new nation’s debt from the Revolutionary War. The revolt they waged was eventually quelled in 1794 after President George Washington dispatched thousands of troops to the region to put an end to the insurrection.
The four-day festival, which is in its seventh year, pays tribute to local heritage through live music, architectural tours, food, spirits and historic re-enactments, with the most popular among them being the tar-and-feathering of a whiskey tax collector.
Belfoure said he created a rye whiskey similar to the rebellion era using organic grain grown at Weatherbury Farm in Avella as a way to fit into the festival.
The festival has helped the year-old Red Pump to “exceed its expectations,” he said.
“We sell all of the whiskey we can make,” said Belfoure of South Strabane Township.
“They have a Rebellion Rye. It’s amazing,” said Clay Kilgore, executive director of Washington County Historical Society.
He said the distillers help the festival to tell the story of how rye whiskey was produced in the region in the late 1700s.
“Liberty Pole is actually using a rye whiskey recipe from that era,” said Kilgore, who is among the historic re-enactors at the festival.
The rye whiskey people, at that time, drank here was clear because it came straight out of stills. The same whiskey that was shipped to such destinations as New Orleans became more like the color of tea because it aged while it traveled in charred wooden barrels, Kilgore said.
“We could tell people about the differences, but now they can walk down the street and see it and taste it,” he said.
Millennials are especially drawn to rye whiskey and the old-school cocktails with a modern twist that are crafted at Liberty Pole Spirits, said Hough, whose son Rob portrayed the tax man who was coated with molasses and chocolate rather than tar Saturday in the 100 block of South Main Street.
“Whiskey is tough to sell,” Hough said.
She said a customer can buy a bottle of whiskey and keep it for a year at home.
Liberty Pole strives to keep its customers coming back by creating new types of whiskey cocktails with their spirits.