CELEBRATE WOMEN’S DAY WITH A BLACK BOTTLE LEGEND

www.blackbottle.com



Make sure that you raise a glass of the bold taste of Islay, Black Bottle, this Women’s Day (9 August) to the memory of pioneering business woman and whisky legend, Granny Graham, and discover for yourself the slightly honeyed sweetness and smoky finish of this famous Scotch whisky.

Black Bottle is a blend of all the renowned single malts from the Isle of Islay, the famous whisky island located in the Southern Hebrides off the west-coast of Scotland, balanced by the finest Highland, Lowland and Speyside malt and grain whiskies, making it one of the most unique whiskies around.

Anne Jane Graham, affectionately known as Granny Graham, was a determined woman, who on the death of her husband in 1926, took over a thriving whisky business and ran it till her death 30 years later. She died in 1958, two years after  that significant day in 1956 when more than 20 000 women of all races and ages marched to the Union Buildings in Pretoria to protest against the pass laws, an historic event we celebrate every year in South Africa on 9 August as Women’s Day.

The story of Black Bottle started in Victorian times when three brothers, Charles, David and Gordon Graham, the sons of a small-town shoemaker, started their own tea blending company in Aberdeen in Scotland and soon branched out into blending whisky. In 1789 they proudly introduced Black Bottle Scotch whisky.

The business flourished but in 1926 the last of three brothers passed away and it was left to Charles’s widow, Ann Jane Graham, to carry on the family tradition and make her mark in what at that stage was very much a man’s world. This strong-willed and highly principled woman, almost always dressed in black, did so with great success. And she did it, not from the company’s offices in the centre of Aberdeen, but from her home, where all business meetings were held.

Over the years she became known as Granny Graham. She not only managed to keep the business going, but to grow it into a highly successful one. She had no male heirs, but so important was it to her that the name Graham should continue to be associated with the company that shortly before her death she convinced her nephew to change his name from Graham Horne to Charles Innes Graham so that he could take over from her!

Today the whisky is very similar to the one created more than 130 years ago and there are very few, if any, that come close in terms of style. Ordinary it is not. The daringly bold taste of Black Bottle has been praised by critics and whisky-lovers across the world, and over the years it has secured a cult following for its unique taste.

The major change has been in the bottle itself – the original black glass for the bottle was imported from Germany, an arrangement that ended in 1914 with the outbreak of the First World War. Since then it has been sold in a dark green bottle, retaining the distinctive pot-still shape.
Black Bottle is available from leading liquor outlets at around R200 per bottle.