Frank “Frog” Bobo

Born in Lynchburg, Tennessee on June 2, 1929, to Roy Holt Bobo and Marie Hobbs Bobo, Frank “Frog” Bobo was the fifth Master Distiller at Jack Daniel’s from 1966 until he retired in 1988. Frank grew up in Lynchburg and worked most of his formative years on the town square at Bobo’s Market.

Working at the family grocery store is where Frank was given his nickname. Jack Daniel’s current Master Distiller, Chris Fletcher, who is Frank’s grandson, stated that one of the gentlemen in town who would come into the family’s grocery shared the first and middle names ‘Frank Thomas’ with Frank Bobo. The elder gentleman had large, protruding eyes like a frog, and so he was given the nickname ‘Frogeye’. When he discovered that they shared given names, the elder Frank Thomas passed the nickname down to the younger, and the townsfolk began calling Frank Bobo “Frogeye”, which was later shortened to “Frog”.

To locals, Frank was not just “Frog”. He was a beloved US Army Korean War veteran, a true southern gentleman, a diehard Moore County Raider fan, and a man with a deep, abiding love for his beloved wife, Avalee. According to his grandson, he was always “the guy who got the calls to go fix something at the distillery in the middle of the night,” and when those calls came, he never hesitated to go.

In 1966, J. Reagor Motlow, Jack Daniel’s grandnephew, who famously gave Frog a nickel every time he saw him, offered him a job in the stillhouse. He was quickly led to the role of Master Distiller. At that time, Jess Gamble, who was Master Distiller from 1964 -1966 (while Frog was in training), was beginning to see Old No. 7 grow from a regional brand to an American icon.

His training finished, Gamble retired, and soon Frog took over. Jack Daniel’s began to advertise regularly, and advertising led to more demand. That demand then exceeded supply. From the mid-1950s to the mid-1970s, Jack Daniel’s whiskey was on allocation. According to Nelson Eddy, the brand historian, “The sales representatives would literally go into an establishment and let them know how many bottles or cases they could have. When other companies were pulling back from advertising, Jack Daniel’s was spending loads of money on ads telling people they couldn’t get it.”

Demand was stoked by bucolic black-and-white adverts that proclaimed: “We’d rather ask for your patience than your forgiveness,” with text explaining the arduous steps of filtering the spirit through maple charcoal and maturing it in charred oak. Bobo was committed to making the whiskey the “same way Jack did” despite the ever-growing pressure to produce more of it, which included diligently adhering to the time-consuming Lincoln County Process.

Jack Daniel’s made a positive out of having to go on allocation, but at the same time, it didn’t want to frustrate large numbers of customers permanently. The challenge was to increase the supply of an artisan-made product. So, while Jack Daniel’s remained available only on allocation through the 1970s, popular culture continued to associate it with maverick independence. Jack Daniel’s then grew into a global brand, almost tripling sales during Frog’s reign between 1973 and 1986.  Frank Bobo oversaw the transformation from a southern sippin’ whiskey into a whiskey recognized around the world.

Also during his tenure, owner Brown-Forman tore down the existing distillery and built bigger facilities on the same site, while the distillery employees continued to go about their work in the open air, walking on temporary wooden catwalks built around the still. The distillery went from operating just two stills to five.

Jack Daniel Distillery Senior Vice President and General Manager Larry Combs stated that Frank Bobo was instrumental to the brand’s success. “Frank and his team worked tirelessly to meet the world’s demand for our Tennessee Whiskey, and Jack Daniel’s would not be what it is today without his many contributions,” Combs stated. “There will never be another one quite like Frog Bobo. As Master Distiller, he set the standard for Jack Daniel’s and represented the hard work, dedication, and attention to our founding principles that we all strive to meet today.”

Frank “Frog” Bobo died on January 15, 2020, at the age of 90, leaving daughters Karen and Cindy, and a host of grandchildren, including current Jack Daniel’s Master Distiller Chris Fletcher. He had lost his beloved Avalee, his wife of 67 years, four years earlier in 2016.

Contributed by: Tiffany Floyd, Chicago, Illinois

with support from Daniel Snyder, Champaign, Illinois