Lot 236: Pitts Place Guthrie KY/TN Whiskey Jug, 2 Gal. ; Pitt Bros.

Pitt Brothers Distillery advertising jug for Pitt’s Place saloon in Guthrie, Kentucky.  2-gallon size, stenciled cobalt border with text including; “From Pitts Place, Guthrie, KY, Distillery Springfield, — Tenn.” 10 1/2 H x 7 1/4 in W.  Early 20th century. Note: Early Robertson County settler Arthur Pitt established a small still on his property in the early 1790s. Over the next several decades, Pitts’ sons, John and Arthur Jr., continued the operation and developed the distillery into a prosperous business. Surviving jugs such as this one suggest the Pitts supplied liquor to, and may have owned, saloons and/or other outlets in nearby Guthrie, Ky, Adairville, Ky, and Clarksville, TN. As the whiskey industry soared in the mid-19th century, competition increased. Charles Nelson’s distillery in Greenbrier became Pitts’ largest competitor, producing over eight thousand barrels of whiskey per year. Business began to decline in the 1880s as tobacco surpassed whiskey in production, and anti-whiskey pressure rose from temperance groups. Prohibition stopped the production of whiskey altogether in 1909 and the company never recovered. Several extant buildings of the Pitt Distillery are listed in the National Register of Historic Places. (Source: The Tennessee Encyclopedia).

PROVENANCE: The collection of Mr. and Mrs. David Allen, Springfield, Tennessee.

CONDITION: Surfacal vertical 6 inch hairline to glaze on right side, with two 1/2 inch glaze flakes near top and lower center of hairline. This glaze hairline does not appear to extend into the base or clay body.