A Fire on Glenns Creek

I am pretty tired of bad things happening this week, to be honest.

Before we moved to Florida, we lived on McCracken Pike in Woodford County, Kentucky, on Glenns Creek, in between the distilleries for Woodford Reserve, Jim Beam, and Old Taylor (Castle and Key now). We lived on a farm there in the middle of horse farms for many years. Our daughter was born there. Our old English Mastiff was named Duke of Glenns Creek. It was one of the most beautiful places I have ever seen in my life.

Last night, lightning supposedly hit one of the Jim Beam warehouses, sending the equivalent of six million bottles of aging bourbon up in flames. The fire burned for half a day. In interviews with firefighters, they said it was the best smelling fire they had ever put out, thanks to the famed “angels’ share” or whiskey that evaporates as it is aging and lingers around the warehouse.

Having spent so many years playing in those waters and getting to know the animals that live there, I am so profoundly sad, however. There’s no doubt that the bourbon has polluted the waters of both Glenns Creek and the Kentucky River, killing everything in its wake.

We sold that property years ago, but it’s sad to see such a fate for a place that we held so dear.