Whiskey Acres Distilling Co. was started in 2013 by father and son Jim and Jamie Walter, fifth-generation farmers, with business partner Nick Nagele on the Walter family farm in DeKalb County, Illinois, about 60 miles west of Chicago. The Walters wanted to diversify the farm by turning their own grain into spirits, brought in the late Dave Pickerell, formerly master distiller at Maker's Mark, as an early consultant, and ran their first spirit off the still in late 2014. Corn, wheat, rye and barley are grown on the farm, mashed with water from the limestone aquifer beneath it, and distilled in a 500-gallon Vendome copper pot still. The whiskey ages on site in 53-gallon charred oak barrels inside a galvanized-steel warehouse, and the bourbons are bottled without chill filtration. The distillery is known for estate-grown bourbon and rye and for an Artisan Series made from heirloom corns such as Blue Popcorn, Bloody Butcher and Oaxacan Green. It remains owned by the Walter family and Nagele.