There are so many distilleries in Pennsylvania that had a huge impact on American whiskey that we just don’t know enough about! One Pennsylvania rye whiskey distillery that doesn’t get nearly enough love is the Meadville Distillery. I’ve done some detailed research on this distillery, and it has been endlessly interesting to me. (You should also check out Meadville Rye Whiskey’s FB page– it is managed by a wonderful local historian that collects all things Meadville and is lucky enough to be from the Meadville area in Crawford County- where it all happened!)
The Meadville Distillery has history going back to 1860- and WHAT a history! It changed hands a few times in its early years, but its most famous owner was a member of the Fleischmann family*- a family with roots in whiskey, but whose international recognition belongs to the brothers that founded the Fleischmann’s yeast empire.
Meadville’s “Puryo” brand earned a reputation for excellence as a PA pure rye whiskey before the distillery was forced to close in 1919. It ended up in the hands of the Frankfort Distilling Company which was based in Baltimore after Prohibition. Meadville’s brick-and-mortar distillery was brought back online after Repeal in 1933, but its new owners** no longer owned the rights to the brand, so they launched “David Meade” rye whiskey instead. The brand did not do well, and the distillery was sold to the Leff family (who also owned the Dillinger Distillery in Ruffsdale, Pa). Samuel Leff managed the location until about 1951. The images I’ve attached below are of a 4-year-old Meadville Rye, bottled in 1934 – photographed in autumn, 2022. (From a private collection in Maryland.)
How cool is this bottle?! While a consumer in 1934 would probably still have associated the brand with Pennsylvania, it was NOT a PA rye whiskey! It was distilled in 1930 by the Frankfort Distilling Company at their plant in Shively, Kentucky (just outside of Louisville) after they were given a medicinal license to distill during Prohibition. It was bottled at their Baltimore location, but it was a four-year-old Kentucky rye whiskey, not a pre-pro PA rye whiskey as most people might think at first glance. This was likely the same distillate that went into both Four Roses rye and Paul Jones rye whiskey bottles from the same era.
Meadville’s “Puryo” Rye Whiskey is one of the few famous pre-Prohibition brands that has been faithfully resurrected here in Pennsylvania (where it belongs)! Conneaut Cellars Distillery is only about 10 miles west of where Meadville Distillery was located, to boot!
While the old Meadville Distillery can trace its history back to 1860, its “Puryo” rye whiskey brand wasn’t launched until 1903- after the facility had been updated by its new investors. The “Puryo” brand was mothballed in Pennsylvania in 1917, was revived by its new owners (Frankfort Distilling Co.) after Prohibition, and finally ceased production around 1951. The folks at Conneaut Cellars Distillery in Conneaut Lake, Pennsylvania released their modern version of “Meadville’s Puryo Rye Whiskey” nearly 70 years later, in 2020. The brand’s owners, Josh Sherretts and Ron Mattocks, partners in Meadville-based Bull Moose Marketing and Historia Inspired LLC (and who also serve as officers of the Crawford County Historical Society), brought in Joal Wolf to recreate the brand’s old recipe. The best part of the brand’s resurrection is that they actually HAVE THE ORIGINAL RECIPE! It wasn’t mashed together from bits and pieces of information- they found the 8-page recipe for Meadville’s “Puryo” Rye as it was being sold through a sealed bid at a local estate sale- and were able to scoop it up! I suppose it helps to be a part of the local historical society!
I met Joal Wolf in 2016 when he was launching his distillery in the back rooms of the Conneaut Cellars Winery. Joal was busy distilling brandies and other spirits from his winery’s grapes at the time. (Those brandies, by the way, were truly wonderful products! I remember thinking that I had never tired anything like them before!) 5 years later, in 2021, I was finally able to pick up 2 bottles of his “Puryo” Rye , and they were consumed in short order (during the Covid epidemic)! The original recipe from Meadville’s Distillery was never going to be identical to the pre-Pro whiskey, as it was being distilled with Joal’s hybrid pot still, but the whiskey stood out as a bold modern interpretation, nonetheless! Over the past several years, I’ve been privileged to catch up with the owners several times. Their efforts to restore the brand and their commitment to preserving its legacy are laudable. I look forward to learning more from both Ron and Joal as they continue to build their resurrected brand. Those antique recipes and distilling secrets are priceless treasures! Honestly, I love seeing stories like this. It warms my Pennsylvania Pure Rye Whiskey-loving heart! I think I need to buy another bottle…
*Gustave Fleishmann was the younger brother of Charles and Max Fleischmann, founders of the Fleischmann’s yeast empire. He began work for his brothers in Cincinnati as a young man and struck out on his own as partner of E.N.Cook in Buffalo, New York.
**The new owners after Repeal were A.F. Miller, a banker and capitalist. Other Meadville-based businessmen included Dr. H.A.Winslow, Charles A Schatz, U.A. Balizet. A fifth investor was a resident of Erie, Pa.