Cragganmore

John Smith had managed the Macallan, Glenlivet and Wishaw distilleries, and he leased the land from Sir George Macpherson-Grant.^1,2,3 John Smith died in 1886, and trustees led by his brother George, manager of Parkmore distillery in Dufftown, ran the business.^4,8,9 In 1887 the first 'whisky special' train left Ballindalloch Station for Aberdeen, its 25 wagons carrying 300 casks of Cragganmore.^1,2,8 Alfred Barnard's 1887 book recorded malting floors, a kiln heated with peat, six washbacks and two pot stills.⁹ The Craggan Burn drove the waterwheels, and John Smith's son William managed the works.⁹ All 90,000 gallons of its yearly output went to James Watson & Co., whisky merchants in Dundee.⁹ John Smith's youngest son, Gordon, took control in 1893.⁸ In 1901 Gordon had the distillery architect Charles Doig rebuild much of the plant.^1,2,4 Gordon died young in 1912, and his widow, Mary Jane, took over the running of the distillery.¹ Production stopped in 1917, in wartime, and the distillery reopened in 1919 with electric lighting from a petrol-driven generator.^1,4

In 1923 Mary Jane sold the distillery to the Cragganmore-Glenlivet Distillery Co., owned jointly by White Horse Distillers and the Macpherson-Grants of Ballindalloch Estate.^1,4,5 White Horse rated the whisky A1, and in 1925 a new warehouse went up with room to age 360,000 gallons.^1,4,5 In 1927 Distillers Company Limited took over White Horse Distillers, and with it a 50% stake in Cragganmore.^4,8 The Second World War halted production in 1941 because barley was short.¹ As late as 1951 a waterwheel still powered the distillery, as mains electricity only reached the area that year.

In 1987 Cragganmore passed to United Distillers, formed from the businesses of Distillers Company Limited and Arthur Bell & Sons, both owned by Guinness.^4,7,8 In 1988 United Distillers chose it as the Speyside malt in its Classic Malts, a range of six single malts.^4,8,11 In 1997 Guinness merged with Grand Metropolitan to create Diageo.^4,5,7 That year a new stainless steel lauter mash tun was clad in pine and topped with the old tun's copper dome.^2,8

It draws its water from the Craggan Burn and uses lightly peated malt.^5,6,9 It has 6 wooden washbacks, where the wort ferments into a beer called wash.^4,8 Fermentation runs for 60 or 90 hours.^4,6 It has 2 wash stills for the first distillation and 2 spirit stills for the second.^4,5,8 Whiskypedia says the flat-topped spirit stills help give the new spirit its complexity; manager Stuart Robertson said they put a choke in the system.^4,5,8 Steam heats the stills, and worm tubs turn the vapour back into spirit.