80 Fun Facts About Jack Daniel's

What did the 361 on old Jack Daniel's labels count?

Town residents: the old label read 'Lynchburg (Pop. 361), Tenn.', and the brand kept the figure for decades while the consolidated city-county grew past 6,000 residents.

Which Louisville-based spirits company owns Jack Daniel's?

Brown-Forman began in 1870 when a pharmaceutical salesman started selling bourbon only in sealed bottles, to guard against tampering; Jack Daniel's is now the flagship of its range.

What was Jack Daniel's real first name?

Jasper Newton Daniel went by Jack; a courthouse fire destroyed the early records, so even his birth year is disputed, and his tombstone gives 1850.

Who taught the young Jack Daniel to distil, and later became the distillery's first master distiller?

Nearest Green was enslaved when he taught the boy on Dan Call's farm; the company long credited Call himself, and only began telling Green's story in 2016.

Dan Call, who took in the teenage Jack Daniel and owned the still he learned on, was also what?

Dan Call was a lay preacher as well as a farmer and distiller; pressure from his congregation made him quit the whiskey business, leaving Daniel to take it over.

Each October, Lynchburg hosts the Jack Daniel's World Championship Invitational, a contest in what?

Barbecue: teams cook at 'The Jack' by invitation only, and winning is the surest way back, since each Grand Champion is invited to defend the title the next October.

Biographer Peter Krass traces the "Old No. 7" name to what?

Biographer Peter Krass traces the name to the distillery's government registration number, 7; when the federal district was redrawn it became No. 16, but Daniel kept the familiar 'Old No. 7'.

Jack Daniel's Tennessee Fire gets its kick from which spice?

Cinnamon gives Tennessee Fire its kick, yet for all the heat in the name the distillery says it is best enjoyed chilled.

Jack Daniel's popularity surged after winning a gold medal for the finest whiskey at which 1904 event?

The St. Louis World's Fair gave Old No. 7 its gold medal in 1904, late in Daniel's working life: within three years, in failing health, he had handed the distillery on.

In the oft-told tale, what gave Jack Daniel the injury that supposedly led to his death?

Kicking his safe in anger, the tale goes, broke Daniel's toe when he forgot the combination; the company dates the kick to 1906, and his biographer doubts it was what killed him five years later.

Which pop star's 2009 hit has her brushing her teeth 'with a bottle of Jack'?

Kesha sang the line in 'Tik Tok', and when the song passed a billion streams in 2024 she celebrated by actually brushing her teeth with Jack Daniel's on camera.

To whom did Jack Daniel give the distillery in 1907?

His nephews took over in 1907, when Daniel, in failing health and with no wife or children, handed the distillery on; Lem Motlow then ran it, on and off, until 1947.

In the 1870s, Jack Daniel's home town of Lynchburg was a regional trading centre for which animals?

Mules made Lynchburg a market town because it sat at the centre of a farming triangle formed by Tullahoma, Shelbyville and Fayetteville.

Jack Daniel's has long been sold in a bottle of which distinctive shape?

Square bottles were Daniel's own choice: he meant the shape to convey fairness and integrity, and the bottle itself is now a registered trademark.

Why did Jack Daniel's stay shut after Prohibition ended?

State ban: Tennessee kept its own prohibition after national repeal in 1933, so Lem Motlow won a seat in the legislature and campaigned until Moore County voted the distillery back in 1938.

Why did the Jack Daniel's distillery stop production during the 1940s?

A wartime ban on making whiskey: the government halted it so that resources could go to the war effort, in what the company counts as the second and last shutdown in its history.

What folksy name does Jack Daniel's give to dripping its whiskey through 10-foot stacks of sugar-maple charcoal?

Mellowing is the company's word for the Lincoln County Process; drop by drop, the charcoal strips out harsh flavours before the whiskey ever reaches a barrel.

Which grain makes up 80% of the Jack Daniel's mash?

Corn is 80% of the mash, with two other grains making up the rest; bourbon needs only 51%, and the distillery credits its top-grade corn with the mash's inviting sweetness.

What does "sour mash" on the Jack Daniel's label mean?

Some old mash starts each new batch, much as a baker keeps a sourdough starter going, which keeps the fermentation consistent from one batch to the next.

The barrels that age Jack Daniel's are built from which wood?

White oak staves are toasted and charred inside to caramelise the wood's sugars, which is where the whiskey gets all of its colour; pressure alone holds them together, with no glue or nails.

Why is the water from the distillery's cave spring considered ideal for whiskey?

The limestone removes iron from it: iron-heavy water gives whiskey a bad taste, and the spring flows from a cave at the base of a limestone cliff.

Jack Daniel's fills each barrel only once; which of these then reuses its barrels?

Scotch distillers buy the used barrels, as do brewers and hot-sauce makers; bourbon and Tennessee whiskey must by law go into brand-new barrels, so each one serves a single fill.

Moore County, home of the Jack Daniel's distillery, is what kind of county under Tennessee law?

Moore County is a dry county: it is legal to distil the whiskey there but not to sell it, apart from commemorative bottles under a special legislative exception.

Which magazine led a petition against Jack Daniel's cut to 80 proof?

Modern Drunkard's editor said Jack would be 'spinning in his grave'; the company replied that a magazine of that name would not dictate how it made its whiskey.

What makes Gentleman Jack unlike Old No. 7?

It is charcoal-filtered twice instead of once, and the extra pass is why the distillery could launch it in 1988 as a smoother, 'superpremium' step up from Old No. 7.

Jack Daniel's Tennessee Honey is bottled as what kind of drink?

Tennessee Honey is a liqueur: Jack Daniel's blended with a honey liqueur and bottled at 35% alcohol, below the 40% minimum for a whiskey.

Which famous singer was buried with a bottle of Jack Daniel's in 1998?

Frank Sinatra kept a bottle at the foot of his mic stand and was buried with one in 1998; the distillery's story is that Jackie Gleason first recommended it to him in a New York bar.

After his death in 2015, fans campaigned to rename a Jack Daniel's highball after Lemmy, frontman of which band?

Motörhead's Lemmy Kilmister was said to drink a bottle of Jack Daniel's a day; in January 2016 a food magazine answered the fans' campaign by renaming his usual highball 'The Lemmy'.

Which country singer wrote a song called "Jack Daniels" and later got his own Single Barrel Select?

Eric Church did more than lend his name to the bottling: years after the song appeared on his album Chief, he worked with the distillery's master distiller to choose its barrels.

Which Formula 1 team became a Jack Daniel's partner ahead of the 2023 season?

McLaren signed with Jack Daniel's in September 2022, and the limited-edition bottle that followed paid tribute to both founders, Jack Daniel and Bruce McLaren.

Which NASCAR team ran the Jack Daniel's No. 07 Chevrolet from 2005 to 2009?

Richard Childress Racing numbered the car 07 as a nod to Old No. 7; Dave Blaney drove it first, then Clint Bowyer from 2006.

Jack Daniel's took the maker of which parody dog toy to the Supreme Court in 2023?

Bad Spaniels, a squeaky bottle-shaped toy, promised 'The Old No. 2 on your Tennessee carpet'; the Court ruled 9-0 that a parody used as its maker's own brand name gets no special shield.

What does every member of Jack Daniel's Tennessee Squire Association receive?

A deed to a plot of distillery land, a single unrecorded inch, makes each Squire an honorary landowner; the club began in 1956, when demand for the whiskey had outrun production.

Why did Jack Daniel's vanish from most Canadian liquor stores in 2025?

A tariff dispute: Canadian provinces pulled American drinks from their shelves in answer to US tariffs, and the whiskey's parent company later reported that its sales to Canada had dropped by 62% in one quarter.

Besides Jack Daniel's, which is the other major producer of Tennessee whiskey?

George Dickel was revived in 1958 at Cascade Hollow near Tullahoma, the next distillery licensed in Tennessee after Jack Daniel's reopened twenty years earlier.

Why is Tennessee's charcoal-filtering step called the Lincoln County Process?

Lynchburg once lay there: the town was part of Lincoln County until Moore County was created in 1871, so the method kept the older county's name.

Besides Jack Daniel's and lemon-lime soda, what goes into a Lynchburg Lemonade?

Triple sec joins the whiskey, a sour mix and the soda in a drink an Alabama lounge owner mixed in 1980; when the distillery began promoting it he sued for $13 million, and in the end lost.

Miss Mary Bobo's, the Lynchburg restaurant where Jack Daniel's visitors dine, spent most of the 20th century as what?

A boarding house: Mary Bobo ran it for most of the century, and after her Lynne Tolley, a great-grandniece of Jack Daniel by the distillery's account, presided over its family-style dinners.

Jack Daniel's Distillery joined which list in 1972?

The National Register of Historic Places listed the distillery in 1972, yet it is no museum: it still makes every drop of the whiskey and draws over 250,000 visitors a year.

Jack Daniel's grandfather Joseph "Job" Daniel emigrated to America from which country?

Joseph 'Job' Daniel came from Wales; Jack's grandmother was Scottish, and a Welshman claimed in 2012 to have found the original recipe in an 1853 family herbal book.

Under NAFTA and Canadian law, Tennessee whiskey like Jack Daniel's had to be what?

NAFTA's Annex 313 defined Tennessee whiskey as a straight bourbon made only in Tennessee, awkward for a brand whose pitch is that charcoal filtering sets it apart from bourbon.

What did Jeff Arnett do after stepping down as Jack Daniel's master distiller in 2020?

Started his own whiskey company: after twelve years in the job, he and partners founded Company Distilling beside the Great Smoky Mountains, where he ages spirits with woods native to Tennessee.

Where in the barrelhouse does Jack Daniel's Single Barrel mature?

On the top floors the temperature swings are widest, so the whiskey there matures faster than barrels of the same age resting lower down.

Which Kentucky bourbon is a stablemate of Jack Daniel's, owned by the same parent company?

Woodford Reserve was launched in 1996, when the same Louisville parent restored one of Kentucky's most historic distilleries and brought it back into production.

Which band's bassist Michael Anthony played a bass shaped like a Jack Daniel's bottle?

Van Halen's Michael Anthony got the company's permission for the bottle-shaped bass by promising to build no more than three; the first appeared in the 1984 'Panama' video.

Which metal band's live album Official Live: 101 Proof copies the Jack Daniel's label?

Pantera's 1997 live album copies the black label's layout, and its title outdoes the whiskey: Old No. 7 was bottled at 86 proof at the time, not 101.

Jack Daniel's is distilled just once, in a still made of which metal?

Copper is the metal of the still, and the mash passes through it only once: the distillery says a single run keeps the warm, balanced flavour that Daniel chose his grains for.

Before he took over the Jack Daniel's distillery, what job did Lem Motlow do there?

Bookkeeper: Motlow was skilled with numbers and soon kept all the distillery's accounts, sitting down with Jack to go over the figures with a fine-toothed comb.

What decides whether Jack Daniel's is sold under its black label or its lighter green label?

Professional tasters decide: both labels start from the same recipe, and the barrels judged lighter and less mature go out under the green label.

Jack Daniel's American Single Malt is finished in casks that once held which fortified wine?

Sherry casks of the Oloroso type finish the whiskey, a step the master distiller says adds richness; the malt spends years in them after its first maturation in new barrels.

The official Jack Daniel's shop in the middle of Lynchburg has traded for over a century as what?

A hardware store: Lem Motlow built it in 1912, while the distillery stood idle, and it still trades under its old promise, 'All Goods Worth Price Charged'.

Jack Daniel's backed Perkins Engineering and Kelly Racing from 2006 to 2015 in which series?

V8 Supercars saw Jack Daniel's Racing run for a decade, following its team from Holden to Nissan in 2013 before the brand bowed out at the end of 2015.

Which singer's 2024 chart-topper declares that he and Jack Daniel's 'got a history'?

Shaboozey says he wrote the line into 'A Bar Song (Tipsy)' because he really does drink the whiskey; the brand noticed, and in 2025 it signed him up for its own concert series.

Chris Fletcher, who became Jack Daniel's master distiller in 2020, first worked at the distillery in which job?

Tour guide was his summer job as a chemistry student, but the stills were already familiar: he grew up in Lynchburg as the grandson of Frank Bobo, an earlier master distiller.

Jack Daniel's workers each get a free bottle of whiskey once a month, on a day the locals call what?

Good Friday is the first Friday of each month, when every employee is handed a bottle as a thank-you; the distillery jokes that nobody has ever called in sick on that day.

In 2021 Jack Daniel's released its first whiskey in over a century to carry what on the label?

An age statement, 10 years old, brought back a practice last seen on the founder's own bottles before Prohibition, and the distillery has since followed it with 12- and 14-year-old releases.

Which Jack Daniel's range follows an 1897 federal law fixing its proof and minimum age?

Bonded whiskey answers the Bottled-in-Bond Act of 1897, passed because so much whiskey was being adulterated: it must be 100 proof, at least four years old and from one distillery in one season.

The Three Wise Men shot ordinarily teams Jack Daniel's and Jim Beam with which third whisky?

Johnnie Walker completes the trio: the shot is named for the three men on the labels, Johnnie, Jack and Jim, with a nod to the Magi of the Nativity story.

Winter Jack blends Jack Daniel's with which seasonal drink?

Apple cider and winter spices go into Winter Jack, a whiskey punch sold for the cold months and meant to be heated before serving.

In 2023 a Tennessee property owner went to court over what spreading from new Jack Daniel's barrelhouses?

A black fungus that feeds on the alcohol vapour drifting from ageing barrels had crusted over homes, cars and trees; a judge halted work on one barrelhouse until it had the proper permits.

Jack Daniel's barrels are built in what kind of workshop?

A cooperage: Jack Daniel's opened its own in Alabama in 2014 to keep up with demand, then sold it ten years later to a specialist barrel maker under a deal that kept the barrels coming to the distillery.

Which hot sauce is aged in barrels that once held Jack Daniel's?

Tabasco ages its pepper mash for up to three years in the used barrels, after stripping out the char so that no trace of whiskey reaches the sauce.

In 2012 Jack Daniel's sent a novelist whose book cover copied its label an unusually polite what?

A cease-and-desist letter, soon called the nicest ever sent, let Patrick Wensink wait for the next reprint of Broken Piano for President and offered to help pay for a new cover sooner.

In 1892 Jack Daniel bought instruments from a mail-order catalogue so that Lynchburg townsfolk could form what?

A cornet band of willing amateurs made up in enthusiasm what it lacked in skill, and Mr. Jack's Silver Cornet Band stayed a fixture of Lynchburg life for some twenty years.

What was Jack Daniel's first new mash recipe since 1866?

Rye whiskey, 70% rye in the mash, is what the distillery calls its first new recipe since 1866, its answer to the rye revival; Old No. 7 uses far less of the grain.

Jack Daniel opened two saloons in the middle of Lynchburg in 1892, the Red Dog and which other?

The White Rabbit and the Red Dog let Jack pour his own whiskey as well as make it; in 2012 the distillery marked the White Rabbit's 120th anniversary with a commemorative bottling.

Which newspaper's June 2016 feature told the story of Jack Daniel's long-uncredited first master distiller?

The New York Times ran it in June 2016; author Fawn Weaver read the story in Singapore, travelled to Lynchburg to research the man's life and went on to launch a whiskey in his honour.

Jack Daniel's sponsored the 2007 launch of which hard-drinking TV drama?

Mad Men had not yet aired when a watchdog group complained that a whiskey sponsor had no place beside its drinking and bedroom scenes, and asked for alcohol-abuse warnings before, during and after every episode.

Which Tennessee-born pop star's 2013 song Drink You Away finds that Jack Daniel's cannot cure heartbreak?

Justin Timberlake sang it with Chris Stapleton at the 2015 country music awards; within weeks the two-year-old album track was sent to country radio, and it gave him a place on the country chart.

Land donated by Lem Motlow's family, long-time owners of Jack Daniel's, became what in 1969?

A community college: Motlow State opened on 187 acres given by Reagor Motlow, Lem's son and a state senator, and it carries the family's name to this day.

Before being lit, the sugar-maple ricks at the Jack Daniel's distillery are doused with what?

Raw unaged whiskey, straight off the still at 140 proof, soaks the ricks, which burn under hoods that catch the sparks and are hosed down before they can turn to ash.

What name do Jack Daniel's and other whiskey makers give to the spirit that evaporates from an ageing barrel?

The angel's share is lost to the air every year a barrel rests; Jack Daniel's once released a small lot of barrels the angels had hit unusually hard, and the little left behind was darker and more concentrated.

Jack Daniel's marketing boasts that Lynchburg has only one of what?

Traffic light: the whiskey is marketed around the world as the product of a town with just one, a small-town pitch for a whiskey sold in bars across the globe.

Which frontiersman lived in what is now Lynchburg from 1811 to 1813?

Davy Crockett moved his family to the area in 1811 and left two years later for a new home in Franklin County, which he named 'Kentuck'.

How was Jack Daniel invariably dressed, as his life-size statue at the distillery shows?

A frock coat and planter's hat, with a vest and a broad bow tie, were his daily dress; Lem Motlow had him sculpted life-size in exactly that outfit in 1941.

Which building from Jack Daniel's own day is preserved as a museum at the distillery?

His office still stands close by the spring, furnished much as he left it; the distillery says he liked to do business on its front porch, in the cool air that rolled down from the cave.

Lem Motlow was a noted breeder of which animal?

Lem Motlow bred Tennessee Walking Horses that competed in the breed's National Celebration, and he owned thousands of acres across Moore and Coffee counties.

Which appeals court sided with a dog-toy maker against Jack Daniel's before the Supreme Court overturned it?

The Ninth Circuit ruled for the toy maker, overturning an Arizona district judge who had sided with the distillery and barred sales of the toy; the Supreme Court then sent the case back.

During Prohibition, the future owner of Jack Daniel's held one of six US licences to make what?

Medicinal whiskey was a rare legal market for a distiller, so the licence let the Louisville firm keep producing; fittingly, its first bourbon had been sold through pharmacies back in 1870.

In 2022, Jack Daniel's announced a canned ready-to-drink cocktail with which partner?

Coca-Cola and the distillery's parent announced the canned Jack Daniel's & Coca-Cola in June 2022, launching it in Mexico first before the US in 2023.