Lamb to re-purpose family buildings for whiskey bottling

The son of a Hoquiam dynasty plans to put the city on the map as the next best place to find American single-malt whiskey.

Emerson Lamb, whose family ties to Hoquiam go back five generations, wants to use a portion of the closed Lamb-Grays Harbor Co. plant for a bottling facility to package the single-malt whiskey he’s been distilling in Seattle’s Sodo Neighborhood since 2009.

For years the Lamb-Grays Harbor plant was one of Hoquiam’s largest employers, making heavy equipment and machinery for the logging and milling industries. It closed in 2001.

Emerson Lamb was at Tuesday’s Hoquiam City Council meeting to explain the next venture for his Seattle-based Westland Distillery. The plan includes using the paint shop building on the Lamb campus. Since 2010, barrels of the whiskey have been aging in his family’s fabrication shop.

Additionally, Lamb will build another warehouse near the two buildings to accommodate his growing supply of whiskey. His collection currently sits at about 3,000 barrels.

The collection of aging whiskey, Lamb said, is the largest aging stock of single-malt whiskey that has ever been produced in North America.

Lamb is the son of David Lamb, who was president of Lamb-Grays Harbor. At Tuesday’s meeting, Lamb explained to the council why it was important to him to bring more of his business back to the town he grew up in, and to re-purpose the buildings his family made its living with.

“This place is a huge part of my inheritance,” Lamb said to the council. “I’m sure that all of you have driven out past the old Lamb-Grays Harbor plant. It is not the thing that it once was. But it is my intention in a new way to bring activity, to bring new life to that which I have inherited.”

In addition to bringing a piece of his business back to his roots, Lamb added that this area of the state is one of the best areas to age whiskey, thanks to its climate. Whiskey’s interaction with the wood of the barrel it’s stored in, Lamb said, is what gives the drink its color and sweetness. The steady temperatures allows the aging environment to remain stable year-round, giving the whiskey a unique taste.

When it begins production in a few months, Lamb said the bottling facility will also package products for Anchor Brewing, a craft brewing company based in San Francisco. Though Lamb admits the bottling facility wouldn’t solve all of the area’s problems surrounding unemployment, he said it would provide several jobs.

Lamb ended his presentation by telling the council he’s often asked why he decided to distill whiskey in Seattle and bottle it in a small town like Hoquiam.

“This is an industry that has a history of supporting people in places that have the audacity to support it,” he said.

Hoquiam Mayor Jack Durney solicited Lamb’s presentation to the council after hearing Lamb talk at a Lions Club meeting.

“To come up with something completely different like distilling whiskey, I think that’s an amazing thing,” Durney said after the meeting. “They could put a bottling line anywhere.”

Durney also spoke to the quality of Lamb’s product — using firsthand experience.

“They also make a hell of a good product,” he said. “It’s an excellent sipping whiskey that you want to drink neat.”