Scott Bush, president of Templeton Rye, and Jason Walsmith of The Nadas stopped by KXNO’s The Jon Miller Show to talk about the storied history behind TR. At 25:12 into the video below, Jason plays an “unplugged” version of Templeton Rye, The Nadas’ musical homage to the infamous whiskey and small Iowa town.

We’re excited to announce that we’ve set up an official Templeton Rye page inside Facebook. All of you are invited to drop by and say hello, ask us questions, share your TR stories, recipes, and connect with other TR fans. From time to time we’ll use it to talk about what’s new at the company and our products.

Meanwhile, we’ve noticed that another Templeton Rye fan group sprouted up on Facebook, run by TR enthusiast Jes Behrens up at Iowa State. This group has over 750 members already, and is truly a grassroots effort completely organized by our loyal fans. We love to see that happen.

Cheers to all, and we’ll see you on Facebook!

Barry Kusel talks about coming across lots of rye crop during harvests in the 1960s, and Templeton’s secret that wasn’t so secret.

To view more TR stories on YouTube, please visit our channel.

Here at Templeton Rye we recently received this nice note from Aaron, an F-16 pilot in the U.S. Air Force, currently based in Italy:

Another F-16 pilot in my squadron is from Iowa and picked up a bottle for me while he was home visiting his family. He’s the one who introduced me to your whiskey and I’m a big fan. I’ll be moving to my next base in Las Vegas, NV at the end of April.

We thank Aaron for his service to our country, and also for this Templeton Rye recipe he passed along:

The Fighter Pilot:
4 Fingers of Templeton Rye
3 Ice Cubes (Optional)
Serve

Mike Moore from Madison, Indiana, wrote to us back in October 2007 with this fantastic Templeton Rye story:

My father-in-law, O.J. Berger, is from Templeton, Iowa, and is 90 years old. Mr. Berger tells the family that his mother, Dora Berger, had the only glass funnel in Templeton and some of the farmers would bring their liquor over and use her funnel to pour the Templeton Rye into smaller flasks.

As a child he remembers the local men of the town being arrested and marched off to jail by federal authorities. Mr. Berger tells the story that only two basements were not raided in Templeton — one was the scene of a wake and there was a body in the basement.

Mr. Berger is quite active and my wife and I ordered a bottle of Templeton Rye for him, which he proudly displays to all visitors and family.

Got a TR story of your own to share? Please leave a comment below, or click here to tell us all about it.