The Spirit of the Mountains: North Georgia's Moonshine Heritage and Modern Distillery Culture

Moonshine and North Georgia go way back. The tradition started with Scots-Irish farmers in the 1700s and survived through wars, Prohibition, and federal crackdowns to end up where it is now: legal craft distilleries making spirits from recipes that have been handed down for generations. If you're visiting Helen and the surrounding mountains, this history is everywhere, and you can taste some of it for yourself at distilleries within an easy drive of town.

Georgians have made moonshine since the late eighteenth century, with the Scots-Irish, immigrants from the province of Ulster in Northern Ireland, bringing the practice of distilling alcohol to the backcountry of Georgia and other American colonies during the eighteenth century. This wasn't mere hobby or rebellion - it was practical economics. During the colonial and antebellum periods, moonshine production played an important role in the state's agrarian economy, with distillation of apples, corn, or peaches into whiskey, brandy, or other alcoholic forms becoming a cottage industry that allowed small farmers to obtain cash.

The rugged terrain and isolation of the North Georgia mountains made distillation particularly attractive to farmers. Because of the region's rugged terrain and poor roads, north Georgia farmers found it easier and more profitable to distill some of their crops before carrying them to market. A bushel of corn was heavy and perishable; a jug of corn whiskey was light, valuable, and profitable. Antebellum Georgians viewed distillers as well-respected members of the community and denounced the federal government's attempt to impose a tax on liquor manufacturing in the 1790s.

The transformation of moonshiners from respected craftsmen to outlaws began with taxation. During the Civil War, the U.S. Congress attempted to balance the national budget by creating the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) to collect taxes on liquor, tobacco, and other "luxuries." The production of moonshine was not in and of itself illegal, but attempts by producers to avoid paying the federal tax were. Such people became known as "moonshiners" because they operated their illegal stills at night.

The response in North Georgia was dramatic and violent. This sparked a much-publicized war in north Georgia between moonshiners and revenuers, the federal agents who sought to enforce the liquor law. Moonshiners attacked revenuers and intimidated local residents who might otherwise be tempted to help revenuers identify lawbreakers. In the early 1870s the Ku Klux Klan joined forces with them to combat the IRS. The scale was staggering: the historian Wilbur Miller estimated that in 1876 four-fifths of all federal law-enforcement efforts and court cases in the Georgia mountains involved illegal liquor issues, more than for the highland areas of any other state.

Shift in Public Opinion

By 1900, public sentiment had turned against moonshiners. The brutal tactics used by moonshiners who resisted revenuers led to a shift in the public's perception of distillers, with many Georgians elsewhere in the state beginning to support the federal government. During the 1880s their sentiments fueled the temperance movement, led primarily by evangelicals, women, and journalists, which encouraged Georgians to refrain from drinking and to accept federal liquor taxation as a means of decreasing alcohol consumption. By the dawn of the twentieth century, many north Georgia communities had ceased supporting the moonshining activity in their midst.

Despite public pressure, Prohibition transformed moonshining from a fading mountain craft into a booming enterprise. The prohibition era began with the passage of the Eighteenth Amendment to the Constitution in 1919 and its implementation in 1920 through the Volstead Act, in which Congress declared all alcohol manufacturing and consumption illegal. Prohibition increased the demand for moonshine. Gangsters soon cornered the market, creating elaborate moonshining networks and forcing farmers to run stills for them.

North Georgia became a moonshine production powerhouse. In the mountain county of Dawson, moonshiners ran millions of gallons of whiskey into Atlanta. Other mountain counties, like Gilmer, Lumpkin, and Pickens, became major producers of moonshine in the 1930s and 1940s. During the peak of Prohibition enforcement, in 1924, 13,023 moonshine operations were broken up across the U.S., and 2,824 - more than a fifth of them - were busted in Georgia alone.

The Birth of Stock Car Racing

The cat-and-mouse game between moonshiners and law enforcement inspired one of America's most popular sports. In Dawson, Union, and other counties, so-called trippers designed high-performance automobiles, called "tanker cars" (most often 1940 Fords), to evade revenuers. Such car chases often ended in the death of the moonshiner or the revenuer. Out of these powerful cars and high-speed chases grew the sport known today as stock car racing (NASCAR).

Corruption and the "Granny Fee"

Law enforcement in the moonshine regions wasn't always a straightforward affair. In Franklin County, Virginia - the neighboring "Moonshine Capital of the World" - local Sheriff D. Wilson Hodges and others realized that they could profit from the moonshine trade by imitating the practices of big city rings. Thus in 1928, the "Moonshine Conspiracy," which eventually gave Franklin County national notoriety in 1935, was born. Moonshiners had to leave bribes, known as a "granny fee" for law enforcement to prevent their stills from being smashed ($25 per still and $10 per whiskey load).

One of the most famous North Georgia moonshiners was Jack "Mimm" McClure, one of the early moonshiners in the North Georgia area in the '50s and '60s. According to local lore preserved by his descendants, Jack "Mimm" McClure (January 25, 1914 - June 26, 1969) was an American Appalachian moonshiner and local philanthropist from Young Harris, Georgia. Local stories abound in the Georgia mountains of McClure's quality bootleg spirits, his charitable giving, and his self delivered justice to those who crossed him. He is also reputed to have been behind the rise of a few notable Georgia politicians of his time.

Most importantly, Mimm perfected a moonshine recipe that survives to this day - now legally produced by his descendants.

The most significant bridge between moonshining past and craft spirits present is Grandaddy Mimm's Distilling Company, located in Blairsville, GA at 112 Wellborn St, Blairsville, GA 30512. The distillery is founded by Tommy Townsend, the great-grandson of Jack "Mimm" McClure, the original moonshiner. Tommy is a musician who played with Waylon Jennings and toured as the lead singer for Waymore's Outlaws before returning home to continue his family's distilling legacy.

Location & Hours:

Blairsville Location: 112 Wellborn Street, Blairsville, GA 30512; Phone: 706.781.1892

Hours: Monday - Thursday: 11:00 AM - 6:00 PM; Friday & Saturday: 11:00 AM - 8:00 PM; Sunday: Closed

Dawsonville Location: 415 Hwy 53 E, Suite 130, Dawsonville, GA 30534; Phone: 706.781.1829

Hours: Monday-Tuesday, Thursday-Friday 3:00 PM – 9:00 PM; Saturday 12:00 PM – 10:00 PM; Closed Wednesday & Sunday

Moonrise Distillery in Clayton

Approximately 45 minutes south of Helen, Moonrise Distillery is located at 31 Webb Road, Clayton, Georgia 30525. This award-winning operation takes a different approach, emphasizing old-fashioned, time-consuming double-distillation that removes impurities for a more refined and complex craft spirit, using methods practiced since the early 1850s.

Location & Hours:

Address: 31 Webb Road, Clayton, GA 30525

Distillery Tours: Monday-Tuesday, Thursday-Saturday 12:00 pm – 5:30 pm (Closed Wednesday)

Sunday: 12:30 pm – 5:30 pm

Downtown Speakeasy Hours: Mon-Thu 1:00 - 8:00 pm; Fri-Sat 1:00 pm - 10:00 pm; Sunday - 12:30 pm - 7:00 pm

Big Creek Distilling in Dahlonega

Big Creek Distilling Co. in Dahlonega is another family-owned operation in the North Georgia Mountains. They take the old methods seriously while putting their own spin on things, and a visit pairs well with a day exploring Dahlonega's gold rush history and town square.