Image via Buffalo Trace Distillery
When Southern Living partially decamped from Birmingham in 2017 to set up shop in of all places……..New York City, there was a collective gasp heard throughout the Southland. New York City! What in the world would they cover – the South Bronx or SoHo (South of Houston Street)?
Devoted readers didn’t have to clutch pearls or chain smoke good North Carolina tobacco for long. Garden & Gun rode to the rescue. The Charleston, South Carolina-based magazine quickly became the secular bible for all things Southern.
From college football to thoroughbred racing; lavish soirees to lovely gardens, if it came with a soft Dixie drawl, the magazine was there to cover it.
One of its favorite topics is bourbon, and where better to find quality bourbon than Frankfort’s own Buffalo Trace Distillery, America’s oldest continuously operating distillery, known for such top shelf vintages as Blanton’s, Eagle Rare and its namesake bourbon?
The magazine’s March issue featured the distillery, but this time it didn’t focus solely on its award-winning bourbons, but one of its other popular offerings as well. Amiable tour guide Freddie Johnson was the subject of one of the issue’s profiles.
On most days, Freddie’s beaming smile greets visitors who have signed up for a VIP tour. His charm comes naturally; his wealth of knowledge comes from being the third generation of his family to work at the distillery.
His grandfather began working there in 1912 when it was still known as George T. Stagg Distillery, and his father followed suit when it was Ancient Age Distillery. Freddie recalls having the run of the distillery beginning at the age of five.
But when he became of legal age to follow the family tradition, his timing was less than perfect – at the height of the bourbon bust.
He was saved from a life of checking telephone towers for AT&T when bourbon had a resurgence in the early 2000s. He began working at the distillery in 2002, and now 24 years later, it’s safe to say he has become a Buffalo Trace legend, radiating star power.
What else can you say about a man who has risen to the status of VIP ambassador, has had a line of sodas named after him, is often besieged with requests to autograph bottles purchased by visitors in the gift shop, and in 2018 became the first African American inducted into the Kentucky Bourbon Hall of Fame?
To what does he attribute his popularity? According to the magazine interview, it’s his knack for “taking technical jargon and explaining it in a way people can understand.”
Like any true ambassador, Freddie can be found extolling the virtues of what he represents – whether it’s leading one of his VIP tours here in Frankfort or working the crowd at New Orleans’ Sazerac House during the city’s annual Tales of the Cocktail (Sazerac owns Buffalo Trace).
Or as outlined in the G&G article, guiding writer Steve Russell through a private tasting of the highly coveted, six-bottle 2025 Buffalo Trace Antique Collection.
To give bourbon lovers something to drool over, that collection includes Sazerac 18-year-old Straight Rye; E.H. Taylor Bottled-in-Bond Bourbon; Eagle Rare 17-year-old Bourbon; William Larue Weller Bourbon; Thomas H. Handy Sazerac Rye and George T. Stagg Bourbon.
Johnson peppers the interview with Freddyisms such as describing the whoof he gets from the Weller bourbon and categorizing the burn from the George T. Stagg as a “Kentucky hug.”
It’s clear that this is a man who enjoys his life as much as his many fans enjoy him. You just know that his father and grandfather are raising a heavenly glass of their own favorite Buffalo Trace brand to this tour guide extraordinaire and global ambassador.
Meet Freddie Johnson in print in the March issue of Garden&Gun Magazine, and then come meet him in person on one of his popular tours.
