The Women Who Changed Whisky History

Women changed whisky history as distillery owners, business builders, traders and designers, long before their work received much attention. Elizabeth Cumming rebuilt Cardow, Ellen Jane Corrigan expanded Bushmills, Bessie Williamson inherited Laphroaig and Marjorie Samuels gave Maker's Mark its name and dripping red wax seal. Their contributions were different, and deserve to be remembered for what each woman actually did.[1][6][11]

Women in whisky history: beyond the exceptional pioneer

The history is broader than a handful of celebrated names. Margaret Sutherland took over the Dalmore business in 1850, Ellen Jane Corrigan took over Old Bushmills in 1865, and Elizabeth Cumming took charge of Cardow in 1872. Jean Macgregor ran Balmenach after her husband's death in 1888. These were women directing established businesses, not merely appearing at the edges of distillery histories.[4][6]

Retailing belongs in that account too. Widow Bourne founded the shop that became Berry Bros. and Rudd in 1698. In Glasgow, Mrs McDonald took a liquor licence for her shop in 1830, where William Teacher worked. Looking only at the people whose names eventually appeared on bottles leaves out women whose shops and businesses helped shape the trade.[4]

There is no need to give every woman a disputed invention or a dramatic encounter with an exciseman to make this history interesting. A licence, a rebuild, an inheritance or a design decision can tell us more about her contribution than a colourful anecdote. The distinction matters particularly at Cardow, where a documented business history sits alongside much repeated stories about Helen Cumming.[1][2]

Helen and Elizabeth Cumming: two different contributions

John and Helen Cumming took a 19 year lease on Cardow Farm at Knockando, Speyside, in 1811. John was convicted three times in 1816 for malting and distilling “privately”, and the distillery's 1824 licence carried his name. Those records make the familiar description of Cardhu as a distillery “founded by a woman” too simple.[1][2]

Sources say Helen probably worked the stills, although that is not reliably established.[1][2] Her image appears on Cardhu bottles, and a golden statue commemorates her at the distillery. Commemoration should not be mistaken for a contemporary record of who held the first licence.[3][12]

The clearest business achievements belong to her daughter-in-law, Elizabeth. Lewis Cumming's widow took over Cardow in 1872, aged 45, and built a new distillery beside the old works in 1884 to 1885. In March 1886 she sold the old stills to William Grant, who was building Glenfiddich.[1][3][4]

Story box: Elizabeth Cumming rebuilds Cardow

story_title: Elizabeth Cumming rebuilds Cardow

founding_story: John and Helen Cumming leased Cardow Farm in 1811; the distillery was licensed in John's name in 1824. Elizabeth Cumming's contribution came later, when she took over the business in 1872.[1][2]

turning_point: Elizabeth built a new distillery beside the old works in 1884 to 1885. This was a physical rebuilding of the business she had taken over, not its founding.[1][4]

documented_record: In September 1893, Elizabeth sold Cardow to John Walker and Sons, securing a board seat for her son John Fleetwood Cumming.[1][2]

sources and claim_source_mapping:

• Farm lease, takeover and rebuild: ScotchWhisky.com, Whisky heroes: The Cumming family, Cardhu.
• Licence in John's name and sale terms: The Sunday Post, Cardhu marks 200 years by celebrating pioneering women at its heart then and now.
• Rebuild: Whisky Magazine, Whisky pioneer.

last_checked: 7 November 2026

Elizabeth had refused an approach from the Distillers Company Limited in 1886 before agreeing to the later sale. A contemporary article about the 1893 transaction credited her with the distillery's continued success. That recognition is particularly valuable: it records how her contribution was described during her lifetime, rather than relying entirely on later celebration.[1][4]

Her story is therefore not simply one of keeping a family business going. It includes rebuilding, deciding against one approach and negotiating another sale with a continuing role for her son. The fuller account of Helen and Elizabeth Cumming separates their contributions rather than treating them as a single founding story.[1][2]

Ellen Jane Corrigan: building Bushmills beyond its home market

Ellen Jane Corrigan took over Old Bushmills in 1865 after the death of her husband, Patrick Corrigan. Fred Minnick's account in The Spirits Business credits her with growing it into an international business and increasing its production.[6]

That is a different kind of achievement from Elizabeth Cumming's rebuild, although both women assumed control after being widowed. Corrigan's importance rests on business development: the account describes an expansion in reach as well as output. She belongs in Irish whiskey history as a business leader, not simply as the link between two male owners.[6]

Placed beside Margaret Sutherland at Dalmore and Jean Macgregor at Balmenach, Corrigan also helps correct the idea that women running distilleries were a recent development. Their dates establish a nineteenth-century record across several businesses, without requiring a claim that any one of them was the first.[4][6]

Cleo Lythgoe and Pauline Sabin: trade and Prohibition

Gertrude “Cleo” Lythgoe's story brings whisky history into the trading world of Nassau during Prohibition. The publisher's synopsis of her autobiography identifies her as the only woman holding a wholesale liquor licence there. It also records her 1923 voyage to Rum Row with Captain Bill McCoy.[10]

The New York Times called her the “Queen of the Bootleggers”, according to Whisky Magazine. Her wholesale licence should remain in view alongside the nickname. Neither the nickname nor the licence alone establishes whether a particular shipment was lawful or whether she smuggled whisky.[9][10]

Lythgoe also left her own version of events. Her autobiography, The Bahama Queen, appeared in 1964 and was reprinted in 2007. It gives her a voice in the telling, while remaining an autobiography rather than an independent assessment of every episode.[9]

Pauline Morton Sabin's contribution was political rather than commercial. She founded the Women's Organization for National Prohibition Reform in 1929. Including her alongside Lythgoe shows why this history cannot be confined to distillery production: women also organised around the restrictions governing the drinks trade.[7]

Bessie Williamson: from summer employee to owner

According to Laphroaig's own account, Bessie Williamson arrived in 1934 for a summer job as a shorthand typist. In 1954, she inherited the distillery on Ian Hunter's death. Those two dates describe the central change in her relationship with Laphroaig, from employee to owner.[11]

Her achievement does not need the claim that she was the first woman ever to run a Scotch whisky distillery. Elizabeth Cumming, Margaret Sutherland and Jean Macgregor already make that wording untenable. Laphroaig's own claim concerns the twentieth century, while The Whiskey Wash reports Macallan's account of a woman called Nettie as managing director from 1918.[4][5][11]

Verdict badge: twentieth century priority

claim: Bessie Williamson was the first woman to run a Scotch whisky distillery in the twentieth century.

verdict: Disputed

what_the_record_shows: Laphroaig claims Williamson was the first woman to own and run a Scotch whisky distillery in that century. The Whiskey Wash points to Macallan's account of Nettie as managing director from 1918.[5][11]

evidence_against_or_gap: Nettie's full name and ownership status are not reliably established. Managing a distillery and both owning and running one are not necessarily the same claim.

earliest_known_source: Not established from the sources checked.

sources: The Whiskey Wash, account of Williamson and Nettie; Laphroaig, producer's account of Williamson.

last_checked: The editor must verify and supply the day of the check.

The useful starting point is therefore Williamson's documented connection with Laphroaig, not a competition over precedence. Read Bessie Williamson's story for the fuller account of her path from secretary to owner.

Marjorie Samuels: a name and a red wax seal

Marjorie “Marge” Samuels changed how a bourbon whiskey presented itself. She named Maker's Mark and created its dripping red wax seal; The Atlantic dates her presentation of the red wax bottle at her kitchen table to 1957.[6][7]

The development involved practical experimentation. Fred Minnick's account reports that she moved the kitchen deep fryer to the basement to test wax. Her son recalled the domestic consequence: “We went seven months without French fries or fried fish.”[6]

Verdict badge: testing the wax

claim: Marge Samuels used the kitchen deep fryer to test wax for Maker's Mark.

verdict: Documented

what_the_record_shows: Fred Minnick's published account records the experiment and her son's recollection of losing the fryer from the kitchen.[6]

evidence_against_or_gap: The account cited here is a retrospective family recollection.

earliest_known_source: Not established from the sources checked.

sources: The Spirits Business, Women who shaped whisky history.

last_checked: 7 November 2026

Samuels belongs in this history for a contribution distinct from distilling or ownership. Naming the whiskey and devising its seal were acts of product identity. Treating design as peripheral would miss what she actually contributed.[6]

Recognition, organisation and the continuing record

The later dates are revealing too. The Distilled Spirits Council lifted its ban on advertising directly to women in 1987, and Peggy Noe Stevens founded the Bourbon Women Association in 2011. Neither date marks women's arrival in whisky; both come long after the business histories described here.[7]

Fred Minnick's Whiskey Women traces women across brewing, distilling and Prohibition trading. That breadth is the useful lesson: whisky history includes the people who made spirit, ran businesses, traded it, challenged restrictions and shaped the bottle's identity. Giving each contribution its proper name produces a richer account than repeatedly searching for one “first woman”.[8]

Where to go next

• Women in Whisky Today: Distillers, Blenders and Industry Leaders: follow the subject into contemporary professional roles.
• Margie Samuels and the Look of Maker's Mark: explore her contribution to the bourbon's visual identity.
• Historical Figures and Whisky: What the Record Shows: examine other whisky stories through their supporting evidence.

Sources

1. ScotchWhisky.com. Whisky heroes: The Cumming family, Cardhu. Web article, publication year not supplied in the fact sheet. https://scotchwhisky.com/magazine/whisky-heroes/27405/the-cumming-family-cardhu/
2. The Sunday Post. Cardhu marks 200 years by celebrating pioneering women at its heart then and now. Web article, publication year not supplied in the fact sheet. https://www.sundaypost.com/fp/cardhu-marks-200-years-by-celebrating-pioneering-women-at-its-heart-then-and-now/
3. Diageo, Malts.com. Women in Whisky: From Past to Present. Producer's account, publication year not supplied in the fact sheet. https://www.malts.com/en-gb/articles/women-in-whisky
4. Whisky Magazine. Whisky pioneer. Web article, publication year not supplied in the fact sheet. https://whiskymag.com/articles/whisky-pioneer/
5. The Whiskey Wash. 5 Things You Didn't Know About Laphroaig's First Female Owner. Web article, publication year not supplied in the fact sheet. https://thewhiskeywash.com/whiskey-articles/5-things-you-didnt-know-about-laphroaigs-first-female-owner-2/
6. Fred Minnick, The Spirits Business. Women who shaped whisky history. Publication year not supplied in the fact sheet. https://www.thespiritsbusiness.com/2019/03/women-who-have-shaped-whisky-history/3/
7. The Atlantic. Women Making Whiskey: An 800-Year History. 14 May 2015. https://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2015/05/women-making-whiskey-an-800-year-history/393260/
8. University of Nebraska Press, Potomac Books. Whiskey Women, Fred Minnick. Publisher's description, publication year not supplied in the fact sheet. https://www.nebraskapress.unl.edu/potomac-books/9781612345642/whiskey-women/
9. Whisky Magazine. The toast of Nassau. Web article, publication year not supplied in the fact sheet. https://whiskymag.com/articles/the-toast-of-nassau/
10. AbeBooks. The Bahama Queen: The Autobiography of Gertrude “Cleo” Lythgoe. Publisher's synopsis of the 2007 reprint. https://www.abebooks.com/9780977372515/Bahama-Queen-Autobiography-Gertrude-Cleo-0977372510/plp
11. Laphroaig. The women who've shaped us: Bessie Williamson. Producer's account, publication year not supplied in the fact sheet. https://www.laphroaig.com/en-gb/whisky-stories/laphroaig-history-then-and-now
12. The Scotch Whisky Experience. Inspiring whisky women past, present and future. Web article, publication year not supplied in the fact sheet. https://www.scotchwhiskyexperience.co.uk/inspiring-whisky-women-past-present-and-future/

This article is desk research based on verified fact sheet TOP-A031, distinguishing published historical accounts, producer histories and retrospective recollections.

Last checked: November 2026