Dueling Grounds Distillery in Franklin, Kentucky, is located in one of the last places in America where it was actually legal for gentlemen to settle their differences the old fashioned way: Twenty paces, turn and fire.
“September 22, 1826: Representative Sam Houston of Tennessee severely wounded General William A. White in a pistol duel near Franklin, Kentucky, over the patronage political appointment of the Nashville Postmaster.”
Fast-forward 189 years to Nashville and meet under-the-radar music business legend Marc Dottore who’s spent 30+ years in artist management with talent like the iconic Marty Stuart, Connie Smith, Kathy Mattea and Sturgill Simpson.
Not a country music fan? You’ll soon know Sturgill regardless. Featured recently in Rolling Stone and Garden & Gun, Sturgill’s a game-changer who made his television debut last summer on Late Night with David Letterman.
But even successful music business execs need a retirement plan, so Marc and his wife Anne who live in Franklin, Kentucky, came up with the idea for a Kentucky craft Bourbon distillery and named it Dueling Grounds.
Bourbon must be aged in the cask three years, but in the meantime Marc needed a distilled product he could begin marketing at once – and the idea for Kentucky Clear was born. By law, this kind of grain-based distilled clear spirit doesn’t even need to be aged three days before it’s sold, hence the cap label “Barely Legal.” Basically it’s government sanctioned illegal moonshine.
