Schedule, musical lineup for Whiskey Rebellion Festival announced
Celeste Van Kirk/Observer-Reporter
Tripp Kline speaks during the Whiskey Rebellion special reserve rye whiskey decision-making process Thursday at Liberty Pole Spirits.
Celeste Van Kirk
Distillers gather for the Whiskey Rebellion special reserve rye whiskey decision-making process for the 2019 festival at Liberty Pole Spirits.
Celeste Van Kirk/Observer-Reporter
Tripp Kline tastes whiskey during the Whiskey Rebellion special reserve rye whiskey decision-making process Thursday at Liberty Pole Spirits.
Washington’s Whiskey Rebellion Festival is “different from all other festivals in the country,” according to festival co-chairman Tripp Kline, and it will be returning to the city’s downtown July 11-14.
At a kickoff event Thursday at Washington’s Liberty Pole Spirits, Kline said this year’s festival will feature a specialty rye whiskey blend, and, for the first time, a Washington Whiskey Walk, where visitors will be able to sample whiskey from more than a dozen Pennsylvania distillers. As with previous festivals, music, food and craft vendors, historical reenactments and an assortment of family-friendly activities will be on tap.
The festival is “unique in its history and unique in our region,” Kline said. In 2019, the Whiskey Rebellion Festival will mark its 10th anniversary, and it will also commemorate the 225th anniversary of the end of Whiskey Rebellion, when farmers in Western Pennsylvania violently resisted a tax on distilled spirits imposed by the freshly-hatched federal government. Another key component of the festival is its lineup of music, and this year’s festival will host performances by, among others, Seattle singer-songwriters Ben Hunter and Joe Seamons; the Gayle Harrod Band, a Maryland-based blues, soul and rock group; and Jake Blount, a fiddler, banjo player and scholar of old-time music from Maryland.
The festival’s rye whiskey blend will be created by seven Pennsylvania distillers and be available in limited quantity starting April 10 in bottled form. It will be available to purchase from the festival’s website, whiskeyrebellionfestival.com.
Kline also noted that the Whiskey Rebellion Festival is “an economic development tool. It has legs. It can identify our community as unique in American history.”
Tickets for the Whiskey Walk, which will happen July 13 from noon to 4 p.m., will cost $25 per person if ordered in advance, and $30 the day of the event. Five-hundred tickets will be available from the festival’s website, and proceeds will benefit the Bradford House Historical Association. All participants must be aged 21 or older.