Nearest Green

“Jack Daniels Legacy. It was a biography by a local journalist out of Tuscaloosa, Alabama, who goes to Lynchburg, Tennessee, to write the authoritative biography on the most famous whiskey maker in the world. And very early on into the book, It introduces this …”

“So all around the internet at that time was that they very quickly determined that Jack was the slave owner, that he stole the recipe, hid nearest, and all these other things. Well, I'm reading this biography and going, not a chance, because I believed that it…”

“The reason why nearest green is credited as the first known African-American master distiller is because he fully turned over the steel to nearest.”

“And then every page, it was either Nearest Green or his sons, Eli Green and George Green. I mean, they were very, very prominent in terms of mentions in this book, and they were mentioned more times than Jack's own family.”

“They all grew up together. They were friends. They ate around the same dinner table.”

“And so the reason why nearest green is credited as the first known African-American master distiller is because he fully turned over the steel to nearest. But I think that had everything to do with the fact that his church and his wife were really pushing agai…”

“You can write out your entire story, literally every element in it, and then break it into sections. So for instance, when you hear me talking about the story of nearest green and the press all the time, I'm usually talking about a particular section of the st…”