A return from the ashes nearly 30 years in the making —family-owned Heaven Hill returned distilling to Bardstown with a toast.

"Right here where it all started," Mayor Dick Heaton said before presenting Max Shapira, the Heaven Hill CEO, with a key to the city.

Credit: Ian Hardwitt, WHAS11

The new Bardstown distillery began production in April, but its predecessor burned down in a searing blaze in 1996.

Some buildings miraculously survived, and bourbon bottling began shortly after.

"We showed up back to work the next morning and never missed a beat," retired manager Bill Osborne said.

He started working at the original Heaven Hill distillery in 1975. An old polaroid from those days shows Osborne beside the man who hired him, Earl Beam.

"That's the first master distiller at Heaven H

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