Shaun Wilson
The name “Peerless Distillery” may not be readily recognizable to many Kentuckians who might mistake it for a newcomer. But Peerless actually is an old-timer. First distilled by E.W. Worsham & Co. in Henderson, Peerless whiskey dates back to the early 1880s. The company later was purchased by Henry Kraver, who changed the name to The Kentucky Peerless Distilling Company in 1907.
By 1920, the distillery was going gangbusters, but alas, Prohibition became the law of the land, and liquor production was halted. Peerless had 6,000 barrels in storage that were available for “medicinal” uses. Yes, the Peerless brand was available by prescription. Sadly, when the last of the barrels was empty, the Peerless brand was gone, too.
In 2014, Kraver’s great-grandson, Corky Taylor, came out of retirement from BENCOR Inc., the financial services company he had founded, to open Peerless Distillery with his son, Carson. The Taylors renovated a 100-year-old building in downtown Louisville, and in 2015, the first barrel was filled with the new incarnation of Peerless. Just four years later, the bourbon was ready, and in June 2019, Peerless released its first bourbon in 102 years.
Peerless Master Distiller Caleb Kilburn, 29, joined the Taylors in 2014 doing what he describes as “grunt labor” while he was in college. Originally from Salt Lick in Bath County, Kilburn worked on his family’s dairy farm from a young age, so he was no stranger to physical labor. He attended Morehead State University, where he majored in chemistry with a minor in integrated sciences. When he had the opportunity to join Peerless to help them physically create the distillery and see it grow from the ground up—no matter what his job title was—he jumped right in.
Kentucky Monthly Assistant Editor Deborah Kohl Kremer recently enjoyed a conversation with Kilburn.
Q What is it about the magic of distilling that got you hooked? Most people go into this industry because they have family ties or they love to drink bourbon. I grew up in a household without alcohol, so I had very little interest in drinking. But I love chemistry, physics and biology, so when I learned about distillation and how all of these aspects are interwoven, well, I fell in love.
Q What does a typical day entail? Well, there is not a standard day, because this is not a standard job. Some days involve greeting the public, signing bottles and tasting product, but other days I’m shoveling gravel, fixing processes and even rolling barrels. There are tons of innovations to be made, and because I love to experiment, I find it all fascinating. As the master distiller, I am responsible for people and equipment from grain to bottle.
Q What makes Peerless different from other brands? Even though it is a new age and a new concept, we have family history to draw from. It is fascinating to revive something that was dormant for so long. Although we didn’t have a recipe, we knew [the family’s] dedication to quality. So this allowed me to start from scratch to create a bourbon but combine their artisanship into our finished product. This is not something that can be mass-produced, so we look at how consumers look at us instead of numbers on a spreadsheet.
Q When visitors come to Peerless, what are they most surprised to learn? People love the intimacy they have with us. They see Carson and Corky working right along with everyone else, and they get to see the whole process. There is nothing staged here. Every drop we produce is made in these four walls.