I noticed the importance of nicknames. The origin of a nickname seems to be a story in itself, but its true value to the storyteller is to hide from prosecution by the guilty friends. Therefore, my friend will only be referred to as “Digger”. Have you ever noticed those people that seem too interested in the contents of their handkerchief after blowing their nose? For too similar a reason, Digger got his name from excavating things he buried that should best have been left alone. Enough said.

Digger and I had a common interest in the science of distillation. This was Kentucky, and Jimmy Carter had just changed the laws regarding home brewing, allowing many old-timer moonshiners like Whitey Johnson to worry less about prosecution and do their part in alleviating the Energy Crisis.

Whitey was an aged and gnarled curmudgeon that might have gotten his nickname from premature white hair, but he was already bald when I knew him. The reason we knew Whitey was from the “Kentucky Mountain Men”, a loose organization of Historical Re-enactors. We did a reenactment of George Rogers Clark’s founding of Louisville, Kentucky, back on its bicentennial. I was explaining to a TV reporter I might be related, but my oldest known Clark ancestor was living in the backwoods of Vermont after the Civil War, not hanging around the other known descendants of either George or his brother William (of the Lewis and Clark expedition fame) when Whitey interrupted and started expounding on live TV how it was shameful in how Louisville had treated its famous founding father and undoubtedly Vermont wasn’t far enough away for a descendant to run. Or something like that. I remember failing to see the connection. Not only was this my first introduction to Whitey, it was also my first introduction to Whitey’s infamous logic.

Wanting to learn the fine art of making moonshine, I could never have found a better mentor, although one that made more sense or had better manners would have been easy. Whitey had forgotten more about distillation than I will ever know, and he wasn’t particularly patient, but I learned. He could also rattle on about what not to do, like not using old car radiators as a condenser because the antifreeze was a poison you’d never be able to wash out. I assume he knew this from experience, and that this experience might have explained much of his logic.

Besides the actual distillation, Whitey taught field craft. This was backwoods knowledge that complemented my Boy Scouting skills, like tracking Revenooers or hiding trails in the woods. I never did find a reason to use my knowledge of smoke dispersal with the Boy Scouts, however. What I learned was how to hide a still from the ATF agents and the best places to hide them, garnering adjectives like “remote” and “inaccessible”.