Locke's 25 Year Old Irish Whiskey Tim O'Connell, Cork, 1978 75cl

A bottle of Locke's 25 Year Old Irish Whiskey. The label is typewritten and appears to be cut by hand. It reads:

Locke's Irish Whiskey

25 Years Old

Courtesy of Tim O'Connell

Cork 1978

This appears to be a private bottling of Locke's Irish Whiskey, bottled in 1978, which could mean it was distilled in the final years of Locke's distillery.

The distillery now known as Kilbeggan was founded in 1757 on the River Brosna, County Westmeath, Ireland. John Locke took over the distillery in 1843 and it remained in the Locke family for three generations. John Locke's granddaughters inherited the distillery in the early 1940s, but Prohibition and the economic depression of the previous decades forced them to sell the distillery in 1947. Production continued under new ownership until 1954 and the distillery was closed in 1957. With support from the local community, the distillery was converted to a museum 25 years later. Whiskey production resumed under the name Kilbeggan in 2007, and utilises a pot still which dates to the early 1800s, the oldest operational pot still in the world.

This Locke's 25 Year Old Irish Whiskey sold at our online auction for £550