Sometime between 1875 and 1880, Col. C.L. Applegate and his brother, Edward, built this distillery near Yelvington – eight to 10 miles east of Owensboro. The plant had a mashing capacity of approximately 250 bushels per day. Its rickhouses were said to have held between 20,000 and 30,000 barrels of whiskey
It continued operations until the fall of 1890, when a water shortage caused distilling to cease until 1906, when the Applegates were able to resume distilling after securing new financing from the Vogt Machine Co. of Louisville. But a year later, the distillery closed again. Part of this distillery remained standing well into the 1900’s, but nothing is left today except the distillery ponds.