We have frequently commented on how the Harvest Hosts program has enabled us to visit so many wineries, breweries and distilleries. These overnight stops eliminate any concern about getting home safely, so long as we are able to walk to our home-on-wheels in the parking lot.

We decided to visit a few distilleries along the Kentucky Bourbon Trail (KBT) as we drove through the state. The KBT is an effort by the Kentucky Distillers Association to promote the state’s many distilleries. The “trail” presently encompasses 46 distillers, some of which are large and well known, such as Bulleit, Four Roses and Marker’s Mark. Others are independently owned Craft distilleries. We limited the distilleries we visited to Harvest Host members that were on our path home. Our favorite was The Bard in Graham, Kentucky.

The Bard is a Craft Distillery with deep ties to the local community, extending even to the distillery’s buildings. The owners are Kim and Thomas Bard who reside on a family farm in Muhlenberg County established by Tom’s ancestor, Isaac Bard, in the early 1820s.

The distillery is located in the former Graham Public School Gymnasium. All of the mashing, fermenting, distilling and bottling are currently conducted in the gymnasium building, which is adjacent to the high school.

Larger capacity distillation equipment is presently being installed next door in the High School. There is also a Grade School onsite that the owners plan to develop in the future.

The W.G. Duncan Coal Company constructed the school buildings for the children of their coal miners around 1925. After the mine closed, the buildings were managed by the Muhlenberg County School District until they decided to close it in 2004. Thomas Bard and three generations of his family attended these schools. It must feel surreal to distill whiskey in your old high school gym!

We had quite a surprise when we entered the tasting room and noticed the bottle shown in the images below.

We had not a clue that we were in Muhlenberg County, the very same county featured in the song Paradise, by John Prine on his first album released in 1971. This album is one of our favorites. Joe fondly remembers attending a concert by Prine at the Mann Music Center in Fairmount Park when he was still in high school.

Depending on your music tastes and/or age, you may not know the music on this album. Prine’s first album is ranked by Rolling Stone Magazine in the top 500 albums of all time (currently number 149).

John Prine, mailman turned singer-songwriter, was born in Illinois. However, his parents were both from Muhlenberg County, Kentucky. The song Paradise recounts the town’s destruction caused by surface mining of coal. All the references in the song, Mister Peabody, the world’s largest shovel and the destruction of the city Paradise are real. Below are the lyrics. Please consider streaming the song and give it a listen.

When I was a child my family would travel
Down to Western Kentucky where my parents were born
And there’s a backwards old town that’s often remembered
So many times that my memories are worn.

Chorus:
And daddy won’t you take me back to Muhlenberg County
Down by the Green River where Paradise lay
Well, I’m sorry my son, but you’re too late in asking
Mister Peabody’s coal train has hauled it away

Well, sometimes we’d travel right down the Green River
To the abandoned old prison down by Airdrie Hill
Where the air smelled like snakes and we’d shoot with our pistols
But empty pop bottles was all we would kill.

Repeat Chorus:

Then the coal company came with the world’s largest shovel
And they tortured the timber and stripped all the land
Well, they dug for their coal till the land was forsaken
Then they wrote it all down as the progress of man.

Repeat Chorus:

When I die let my ashes float down the Green River
Let my soul roll on up to the Rochester dam
I’ll be halfway to Heaven with Paradise waitin’
Just five miles away from wherever I am.

The special release bourbon named, You Got Gold, is a fundraising collaboration between The Bard Distillery and the Hello In There Foundation, established by Prine’s family to honor John’s memory. The Foundation offers support to people who are marginalized, discriminated against or forgotten. The name of the Foundation, Hello in There is a reference to another song on Prine’s first album.

I bet you thought we would never get around to writing about the bourbon! As you can see there was a lot to sample. And sample we did, knowing that we only had to be able to walk across the parking lot when we left the sampling room.

All the bourbons were wonderful, as were the flavored whiskeys. Our favorites were the Cinder & Smoke bourbon (10 year-old), Salted CaraMühl Cream Liquor and the Apple Pie Mühl Whiskey. We were surprised especially by how natural the apple pie flavor tasted. The Bard ships all of their products so you can do more than just read about it. In fact, we just ordered a few bottles. Shipping was very reasonable.

This was a serendipitous stop for us. We thought we were just going to sample some bourbon and we ended up recalling some wonderful music memories from our youth.

Sadly, John Prine succumbed to complications from COVID-19 in 2020. Per the final verse of his song Paradise, John was cremated and his ashes released in the Green River.

This is the last installment of our 2025 travel posts, just in time for us to start traveling again in four weeks. In the meantime, we will have a couple RV-related posts to share over the next few weeks.

“Hello in there” from us and thanks for stopping by. Your visits bring us joy.