|
The Glenlivet Whisky Distillery
The Glenlivet Distillery Established
1824 |
Distillery Tour Information
The Glenlivet Distillery offers a n interactive exhibition as
well as other special attractions during your visit, which includes
the magnificent scenery that surrounds it. This fascinating
hands-on display of The Glenlivet and its history is not to
be missed!
Admission is free. No one under the age of
18 will be admitted.
The guided tour takes in the distillery and the vast bonded
warehouse. You can choose a dram of The Glenlivet 12, 18 years
old, or French Oak Reserve. There's a coffee shop which offers
light meals and fine home baking.
Opening Times
April 2 - October 26, 2007
Monday - Saturday: 09.30 - 16:00 hours
Sunday: Noon - 16:00 hours
Contact The Glenlivet Distillery
Ballindalloch Banffshire
AB37 9DB Scotland
Tel: +44 (0)1340 821 720
Location
B9008, ten miles north of Tomintoul
THE GLENLIVET
THE SINGLE MALT THAT STARTED IT ALL
Lawless Times & the Character of Glenlivet
During the early 1800s, large areas of Scotland were brought
to the brink of anarchy by the activities of whisky smugglers.
Excisemen, armed with pistols and cutlasses, fought bloody battles
with the smugglers. Thousands of illicit distillers were prosecuted
each year and close to 400 people were convicted and fined in
just one sitting by an Inverness Justice of the Peace for breaking
the Excise laws.
By 1820, there continued to be some 200 illicit stills in Glenlivet;
the glen of the Livet reaches deep into the mountains which
separate Speyside from Royal Deeside in the far North-East of
Scotland. Today it is relatively remote; in the 18th and 19th
centuries it was virtually inaccessible and it bred a bold and
self-reliant people who clung to the old tradition of whisky-making.
The whisky made in Glenlivet had the highest reputation of
any in Scotland, for several reasons. First, you can’t
make good whisky in a hurry and the Glen’s remoteness
made it almost impossible to police. Excise officers could be
spotted miles away, leaving plenty of time to hide equipment,
and, more importantly, plenty of time to carry out the distilling.
Second, nature’s essentials for making the finest malt whisky
– barley, peat and a copious supply of good, clean water
– were all abundant. The fertile valley-bottom of Glenlivet
provided barley. The hills around are clad in peat. The water
that rushes down the hills surrounding Glenlivet is perfect: cold,
soft, melted snow. Whisky smugglers would travel from Glenlivet
to the Lowlands on drove roads and across bridges that can still
be found today.
The Legacy of George Smith
It took a remarkable man to break the tradition of illicit distilling:
in 1824 George Smith took the unswerving step from farmer-distiller
to first licenceholder in the glen, the first step on Scotch whisky’s
march to global success.
In those lawless times, he had to go to extraordinary lengths
to protect his life and his property. He armed his brothers with
“two or three stout fellows” whom he employed, and
they mounted a guard on the distillery, night and day, for several
years. In his later years he claimed that he often “had
rough times of it among the glen people,” when he went to
church or visited the market at Tomintoul.
When he went legal he also had to go armed. His former colleagues in the illicit
trade swore they would “burn down his distillery and him
at the heart of it.” But the winds of change were with
him. The fame of his whisky spread even beyond Scotland, nurtured
by his Edinburgh agents who began to market it as Old Vatted
Glenlivet - the very first ‘brand’ of Scotch.
On the back of this success, in 1858 Smith built a new distillery
on a larger site further down the glen, supplied with water
by Josie’s Well, a now legendary spring rich in minerals.
He also invested in a pair of unusually shaped stills, uncommonly
high and wide, of a novel ‘lantern’ design –
both factors which make for increased purity and elegance.
The Reputation of The Glenlivet
The Glenlivet has long been synonymous with the finest single
malt Scotch whisky. In 1822, King George IV made a triumphant
visit to Edinburgh. Sir Walter Scott, who arranged the event,
made sure to procure the best whisky Scotland had to offer for
the King’s delectation: the whisky of Glenlivet. Throughout
his week-long jaunt, the King would drink nothing else, and
by the end it was reported that “he is an admirable judge
of glen livat”. He was not alone in his enjoyment. The
same year, John Stein, one of the leading distillers in Scotland,
wrote enviously: “There are some people in the higher
stations of life who prefer Glenlivet whisky and who would pay
almost any price for it”.
The fame of Glenlivet’s now well-respected fruity, floral
style encouraged other distillers to attach the name to their
own, even though some of them were miles from the Glen itself.
Understandably, George Smith’s son was not happy about
this. In 1884 he obtained a settlement which required that only
his malt can describe itself as ‘The Glenlivet’.
And to this day, there is still only one single malt whisky
that has the unchallengeable right to call itself The Glenlivet.
In fact, almost every Speyside distillery has, at some stage,
used the name Glenlivet.
The Glenlivet in the 20th Century
Maintaining the pioneering instinct, The Glenlivet was the very
first malt to be promoted in the United States: as soon as Prohibition
was lifted in America, George Smith’s great-grandson went
there to promote his whisky, the first single malt ever seen
in the U.S. Over the next few decades it caused such a stir
that he featured on the front page of Time magazine with the
line: ‘The heart of Great Britain’s export trade
is the Scotch whisky industry. The heart of the Scotch industry
is The Glenlivet’. The Pullman Company of Chicago begged
The Glenlivet Distillery for supplies of miniatures for their
luxury trains.
The Glenlivet developed a strong following among Hollywood
stars in the 1950s. Stars like Yul Brynner and Robert Taylor,
who had (to quote the latter) “come to consider all other
brands of Scotch whisky second rate”, insisted that stocks
be available in their hotels – even if they were filming
in Europe.
The Glenlivet’s reputation was not confined to the UK
and the US. In 1956 the manager of the renowned George V Hotel
in Paris wrote to the distillery: “Our President requires,
for his own personal use, a case of 12 bottles of your Glenlivet
12 year old Whisky, as he was agreeably impressed by this whisky
during his recent visit to America.”
For nearly 200 years the legendary whisky of Glenlivet has
been prized, celebrated and fought over. But there is only one
whisky with the unchallengeable right to be called: The Glenlivet:
the single malt that started it all.
Courtesy of The Glenlivet
|
George
Smith knew that Glenlivet was the perfect location in which
to make whisky, which is why he built his distillery there in
1824. But it required all his skills as a distiller and his
unrivalled knowledge of the glen and its resources to succeed.
The Glenlivet of today is George Smith's priceless legacy. Crucially,
the three fundamental elements in the whisky-making process
- spring water, copper stills and oak casks have remained unchanged.
So have the skills have the people who make it. That is why
the Glenlivet is as incomparable now as it was at the beginning.
