This is a good news story for Barbados. It shows the world that although a small island we can produce a world class product. We have world class rum, we have a world class entertainer. What more inspiration do we need?
Congratulations to the Seale family and Team at Four Square Distillery!
International Wine and Spirits Challenge (IWSC) Rum Producer of the Year and Spirits Producer of the Year 2021 – Foursquare Rum Distillery – R L Seale & Co Ltd, Barbados
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Congratulations to the owners and directors of RL Seale &Co on achieving this signal honour. This is who we are. We aim for excellence. Let us hope that this company remains in local hands.
We have the greatest rum and the greatest leader! Once again Barbados sets global standards.
It’s a most apropos time for Bajan rum distillers produce a ‘vintage’ called the “President’s Edition” to celebrate the country’s first year of Republicanism.
It should also make reference to the important role played by the former little titan country called Barbadoes in George Washington’s efforts (after his only visit to a foreign land) to make ‘America Great’ through its many shipments of Rum bullion in hogshead to the same Washington’s estate on Mount Vernon to give his freedom fighters the Bajan-spirited courage, honed at Oistins Bay, to defeat the British against all the odds.
Barbados 🇧🇧 Birth place of Rum.
“Congratulations to the Seale family and Team at Four Square Distillery. ”
Xxxxx
Tomorrow?
The government as well as the citizens of our great nation have a choice to make. They can either sit idly by and allow themselves to be entangled into further debt, or they can diversify the economy. Under no circumstances should a country like Barbados determine their worth by record number of arrivals at both air and seaports. BDS need a viable commodity going forward. Medical Weed Cultivation ?
That boat left a few years ago. licensing fees/stipulations derailed opportunities.
Peter Lawrence Thompson need to pull something out of that 🎩, one more time…🎶
(Miller) is one of the greatest living poet’s to date.
May you get to Heaven before the devil 👿 knows you’re dead.
It only took 4 shots of tequila…
All the RUM in the world didn’t give Bajan whites any play on BU today.
Ain’t that a shame🎺🎼
@ David Seale
Why “McCoy” wasn’t included in the photo shoot????
McCoy, to my taste, was not one of their better rums. The LCBO sold it off at a steep discount.
Once I could find their rums in Fla. The 10yr in the black bottle, and Doorley XO are around, but I haven’t come across the others.
I’ve often wondered how the name Four Square originated.
When I started looking at old maps I thought perhaps it signified an area of Four Square miles but the more I examined this hypothesis the more I realised there is far more to the name.
On the 1680 Ford Map it appears as an area, not the factory/plantation we know of today.
One hundred years later on the 1775 Jeffreys Map it appears also as an area and in the plural, Foursquares.
The Quaker Meeting that was close to Four Roads is apparent.
Is Four Square in some way perhaps related to Quakerism?
I figure so.
Quaker Meeting Houses like those of the Puritans before them had no front or back but were organized so entry was from all four points of the compass with no one able to occupy the front rows.
That symbolized the equal access to their Meeting House to all and sundry from whatever direction they came.
Slang for C₂₁H₃₀O₂ is Bob
Bob Marley — ‘Herb is the healing of a nation, alcohol is the destruction.’
Poor John, everything is quakerism.
I bought a bottle of Foursquare and found it too expensive for the taste. I have had better Jamaican and Guyanese rums. But I don’t know if they won any awards.
McCoy is the Black Distiller. He had de real McCoy and gets no credit…You were making reference to Macaw Rum.
add a little water to jamaican rum and its good for getting insects off your grill
re Poor John, everything is quakerism.
instead poor fool DAME BAJANS
THE FACTS ARE THAT THE QUAKERS DID PLAY A SIGNIFICANT ROLE IN THE EARLY HISTORY OF BARBADOS——A SUBJECT THAT HAS NOT BEEN WELL TAUGHT IN OUR SCHOOLS
THE FACTS ARE THAT SEVERAL PLANTATIONS AND VILLAGES WERE NAMED AFTER THE QUAKERS
THIS HISTORY WAS WELL PRESENTED ON THE STOP AND STARE WALKS IN THE 90’S
AT LEAST THE QUAKERS WERE REAL
QUITE UNLIKE SOME INEPT SUPREME LEADER SO CALLED—–SHE IS NOW EVEN BEEN SAID TO BE ALL POWERFUL
JOHN , PLEASE CONTINUE TO TELL US ABOUT THE QUAKERS
YOUR POSTS ARE EDUCATIONAL AND ENLIGHTENING
Foursquare has a rum labelled the Real McCoy. In fact several different versions, 5, 8, 12 yr etc.
It would be interesting to know how many different products Foursquare produces, as many are ‘limited runs’.
@Dame
I would agree the few products seen from Foursquare at the LCBO are overpriced and not worth the $$. However you can find Doorleys XO $20, and R.L.Seale 10 $23.99 (the one in the bent shaped black bottle) both of which are very drinkable.
The flip side, is the other day I went into a so called ‘Rum Bar’ in Florida. It was interesting to note they had in other spirit categories, at least one high end. Grey Goose, JW Black and Glenmorangie, etc, but in rum Mount Gay Eclipse and Bacardi 5 were the “best” they had. Foursquare has addressed the high end level in Rum.
Isn’t rum like most liquors an acquired taste? The blogmaster is reluctant to use the word good or bad when describing liquor.
Herbert Hoover was a quaker, ….hoovers all over the island
GPMarch 8, 2022 1:27 PM
JOHN , PLEASE CONTINUE TO TELL US ABOUT THE QUAKERS
YOUR POSTS ARE EDUCATIONAL AND ENLIGHTENING
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Will do and thanks.
The intention is to educate and enlighten although I have to admit I also get some mirth out of some of the responses.
@ David,
the best liquor is FREE liquor. lol
Hants some love Appleton, others Bacardi, Mount Gay etc.
LawsonMarch 8, 2022 1:33 PM
Herbert Hoover was a quaker, ….hoovers all over the island
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A teachable moment on BU!!
Before he became President, Herbert Hoover was Secretary of Commerce and directed Famine Relief to the Russia and the Ukraine from the Spring of 1921 during the Great Russian Famine, another way the West reached out to Russia and for Grasshopper’s edification, another Quaker link to Russia.
https://www.jstor.org/stable/127297
https://www.jstor.org/stable/40108146
Hoover studied geology at Stanford when it first opened and worked around the world.
He was also an engineer.
The Hoover Dam on the Colorado River memorializes his contribution to his nation’s life was opened in 1933 and there is also the Hoover Institution.
Clearly he left his mark on the world, as did other Quakers before him and that’s why it is so easy to find a Quaker link to most countries.
Congratulations to the owners and directors of RL Seale &Co on achieving this signal honour. This is who we are. We aim for excellence. Let us hope that this company remains in local hands.
xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
WHO IS WE?
THE WHITE MAN ON THE 2 x3 ISLAND GETTING RICHER AND RICHER WHILST THEIR WORKERS CATCHING HELL LIVVING FROM PAYCHECK TO PAYCHECK.
THAT IS HOW IT IS ON THE ISLAND START LIVING IN REALITY.
Baje what do people who work at 4 square get paid?
Here it is we have a best in class company that is local. This company has won a prestigious award for its product. This is a company producing product that is exported to generate foreign exchange. The blogmaster again extends congratulations on behalf of the BU household to the Seale family and team.
Quite surprising here because Foursquare has been winning prestigious awards for sometime now !
@ David
You are correct about taste in liquor it’s really no different from sweet drinks. We all have different tastes and choices.
That being said ,most connoisseurs, will may agree that Mount Gay ( Barbados) and El Dorado ( Guyana) are very good brands.
HantsMarch 8, 2022 6:59 PM
https://www.visitbarbados.org/things-to-do/experiences/birthplace-of-rum?pageindex=1
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Yet another teachable moment.
You all realize that the Gay family was an early QUAKER family.
The earliest will I see from that family was of a Dr. William Gay written in 1655 and probated in 1660.
It describes his plantation in St. Lucy and names Roger Jones as his Friend , i.e. he and Roger Jones were members of the Society of Friends.
There is a Thomas Gay, writing his will in 1656, probated in 1657.
He names as his Friend, Captain Tobias Frere and Christopher Carew.
The brother of Christopher Carew was a surgeon and was buried in 1680 on the plantation where I live.
The brother’s name was also John.
Alcoholic beverages were consumed at the time because in their brewing and distillation, all harmful bacteria were eradicated making them safe to drink than water.
Many Quakers in the UK and also in the colonies in America were brewers and no doubt started making rum here long before 1703 which is the year Mount Gay Rum is “supposed” to arrived on the scene in Barbados.
So “Barbados Rum” is actually one more example of Quaker industry.
DavidMarch 8, 2022 1:31 PM
Isn’t rum like most liquors an acquired taste? The blogmaster is reluctant to use the word good or bad when describing liquor.
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Another teachable moment.
Ale, beer, rum were safe alternative to water.
INDEED JOHN
MAKES PERFECT SENSE
THIS WAS THE REASON PAUL ENJOINED TIMOTHY TO TAKE A LITTLE FERMENTED WINE (ONIOS NOT GLUCOS) FOR THE STOMACH’S SAKE
“Ale, beer, rum were safe alternative to water.”
but alcohol does not hydrate you
alcohol dehydrates you.
Alcohol is a diuretic. It causes your body to remove fluids from your blood through your renal system, which includes the kidneys, ureters, and bladder, at a much quicker rate than other liquids. If you don’t drink enough water with alcohol, you can become dehydrated quickly.
if you alternate alcohol with glasses of water like Australians do you may be ok
The other popular drink in the 17th century was Madeira wine.
Madeira was a port of call on the way to the East Indies and the Colonies of America of which Barbados was one.
Wine was made there for sale to the ships plying the Atlantic and around the Cape of Good Hope to the East Indies.
@ John March 8, 2022 7:48 PM
(Quote):
Many Quakers in the UK and also in the colonies in America were brewers and no doubt started making rum here long before 1703 which is the year Mount Gay Rum is “supposed” to arrived on the scene in Barbados.
So “Barbados Rum” is actually one more example of Quaker industry.
(Unquote).
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Sir John, why can’t you give credit where it is clearly due?
Arguing that the Quakers ‘discovered’ rum (or to be exact, Kill-Divill) is as much folly as perpetuating the myth that Colonel Sanders ‘invented’ Southern-fried chicken.
Rum or kill-the-devil was ‘discovered,’ through consumption, by the black slaves as a serendipitous by-product in the production of raw sugar.
The same way the black slaves- who were taken from West Africa to the Southern parts of North America- enhanced significantly the taste of the Scottish style of frying chicken by adding those secret herbal ingredients.
It is true that those good old Christian Quakers made money from the subsequent improvements to the quality of the r(h)um bullion for export the same way the mock colonel Sanders became rich and famous from franchising his ‘stolen’ recipe.
Next time around your mulberry bush you could be just as adamant in your twisting of Bajan history by contending that Sir John Redman Bovell was a Quaker and “discovered” the art of breeding sugar cane which saved the industry in Barbados (and the wider Caribbean) from extinction due to genetic cloning.
But the country does miss the entrepreneurial spirit of Quakerism. How well they would be performing in bringing the inchoate marijuana business to above-board profitability commercial respectability and legalized standing; just like rum.
Been thinking alot about the Quaker, Herbert Hoover and the millions he saved in the famine induce by Stalin and Lenin in 1921-22.
https://www.c-span.org/video/?466620-1/american-relief-administration-1921-22-soviet-famine
The second famine, 1931-32, was a genocide designed to eliminate the Kulaks as a class.
The New York Times and its Moscow correspondent purposely hid the famine and glorified Stalin.
No help came as it had done for the 1921-22 famine because Stalin wanted to wipe the Kulak class off the earth.
Herbert Hoover as President (1929 – 1933) was in the midst of the Great Depression and the mid west was a dustbowl.
https://www.mnopedia.org/agricultural-depression-1920-1934
By the time Hitler came to power in 1933, Stalin had seen to the extermination of millions of his own people.
@ John March 8, 2022 11:36 PM
(Quote):
Been thinking alot about the Quaker, Herbert Hoover and the millions he saved in the famine induce by Stalin and Lenin in 1921-22.
(Unquote).
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Why don’t you tell us about the other “Hoover”; J. Edgar the first FBI Chief?
In addition to being in the ‘closet’ was he also from a Quaker family of witch-hunters?
After all, (s)he J.E. would fit perfectly your measure of a true gentleman; anti-communist, anti-black, anti-woman.
Historians seldom agree on anything, but there is agreement around them that Herbert Hoover was one of the worst Presidents of the USA but all that matters to John is that he was a Quaker.
BTW he was an avowed racist a hater of Black and Brown people who deported 2 million Mexicans from the US. So much for Quaker Christianity and beneficence
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HERBERT HOOVER WAS CONSIDERED A RACIST BY MANY OF HIS black contemporaries. W. E. B. Dubois, the great civil rights leader, charged Hoover with being an undemocratic racist who saw blacks as a species of “sub-men.”‘ Walter White, the Exe cutive Director of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) during Hoover’s presidency, con temptuously referred to Hoover as “the man in the lily-White House.”^ Even Robert R. Moton, the conservative successor to Booker T. Washington as political advisor to Republican presidents on the “race question,” came to believe that by his actions as president. Hoover had shown his contempt for blacks.^ Dissatisfaction with Hoover among blacks was widespread during his administration. John Hope Franklin, the dean of black historians, argues convincingly that Hoover was largely re sponsible for laying the foundation for disaffection of blacks from the Republican party during his presidency.” Much of the black criticism of Hoover was due to his south ern policy as president. The first Republican since reconstruc tion to break the solid South in 1928, Hoover moved to consoli date his southern victory by openly purging blacks from the leadership positions in the southern wing of the G.O.P. with the ‘The Crisis, XXXV (May. 1928), 168. ‘Walter White, A Man Cailed White (New York: The Viking Press, 1948), 102. ‘Letter. Moton to Newton. April 18, 1930, Parker file. Presidential Papers. Herbert Hoover Papers (HHP), Herbert Hoover Presidential Library (HHPL). ‘John Hope Franklin, From Slavery to Freedom (New York: Vintage Books, 1969), 524. 507 T HE ANNALS OF IOWA expressed purpose of attracting southern whites to join the party of Lincoln.
By 1922, before Hitler even became household name in Germany, Stalin and Lenin (Communism) had killed more people than Hitler killed Jews in the Holocauast.
Lenin died in 1924.
The second genocide Stalin was responsible for was in 1932 – 33 when he set out to eradicate the Kulaks and that was before Hitler even came to power.
The famine of the 1930’s in the Ukraine was called the Holodomor, and no one in the Soviet Union was allowed to even mention the word.
Remarkable how closely the word Holocaust and Holodomor resemble one another.
MTA/Sarge
The old racist trick doesn’t work anymore.
It has been overused against individuals and no longer works.
You would need to dig into the anals of the Trans Saharan slave trade to find anything remotely similar to what Stalin/Lenin did or what subsequently Hitler did.
Hitler’s headcount was far smaller than Lenin or Stalin.
Chairman Mao is also worth examining too.
Fascism, Communism, Marxism and Socialism are Godless ideologies and where racism is to be found.
Racism is used as a tool of those ideologies to divide peoples and achieve the goals of the State.
Hoover and the ARA saved over 10 million people in the Soviet Union and still Lenin/Stalin were able to kill over six million in 1921 -22, just two years, less than half the duration of WWII.
Yes, Hoover’s presidency was a disaster but there is no evidence he killed anybody.
… and yes, he was a Quaker and as we all know, Quakers were also responsible for legally ending slavery in the World, to mention just one of their contributions to mankind.
Go see if you can find another group of humans which has made contributions even remotely similar to humankind and if you manage to, within that group you will find Christianity.
ON THE INTERNATIONAL SCENE WE HAVE PUNK BIDEN VS PUTIN ET ALITER
ON BU WE HAVE JOHN THE BARBADOS SCHOLAR VS THE BU SEMI ILITERATES
VERY HILARIOUS AND MOST ENTERTAINING
@John
The old racist trick doesn’t work anymore
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This from a man who continually brought up Sen. Robert Byrd (Democrat) and his connection to the KKK on these pages. Now we observe a Quaker who has feet of clay and John says, “No Mas”.
John if you can’t stand the heat stay out of the kitchen
Once you descend to calling Hoover a racist you are saying there is no answer to the logic.
You need to target Lawson for bringing up Hoover as a Quaker.
Lawson keeping quiet before he gets called a racist.
Don’t worry your head Lawson, by now everybody knows Sarge and Miller don’t have a leg to stand on!!
“ON BU WE HAVE JOHN THE BARBADOS SCHOLAR VS THE BU SEMI ILITERATES”
it seems like the Barbados Scholars must have done a lot of fagging
RE John if you can’t stand the heat stay out of the kitchen
LOL MURDAH
THE BU INTELLECTUAL KITCHEN IS MORE LIKE A FREEZER
LOOK WHO TALKING NOW, THE EXPERT ON PHARMACOLOGY.
SARGE, YOU REMIND ME OF THE SARGE IN ZORRO MOVIES OF OUR CHILDHOOD
Go see if you can find another group of humans which has made contributions even remotely similar to humankind and if you manage to, within that group you will find Christianity.
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I’ll give you a hint, they started from the same countries as the Puritans but went east!!
… and they are farmers!!
@ John March 9, 2022 8:50 AM
(Quote):
Go see if you can find another group of humans which has made contributions even remotely similar to humankind and if you manage to, within that group you will find Christianity.
(Unquote).
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And all along we thought that the Jews held that pride of place by being your Yahweh’s chosen people!
Yes indeed Pres. HH was a Quaker! So why, then, didn’t he push for the passing of anti-lynching laws during his presidency?
Why leave up to FDR’s Lady Eleanor to be the presidential torchbearer against lynching and other civil rights violations making her a true ‘Christian Quaker’ instead of your slave-owning quacks?
You might be a b(l)uffer when it comes to Bajan slave history; but please step aside to give way to our own “Sargeant” when it comes to world history; especially North American.
|THE BU INTELLECTUAL KITCHEN IS MORE LIKE A FREEZER
LOOK WHO TALKING NOW, THE EXPERT ON PHARMACOLOGY.|
these lower black people should know their place said the bajan scholars
who don’t see truth as an actuality
and talk monotonous bullshit
John dont worry about me. I am just waiting for the usual no proof Baje et all allegations that the Quakers used to make rum out of old slaves rather than applaud bajans for a bright spot in a lackluster economy.
JOHN NEEDS TO LEARN THE BIBLICAL TENET AND NOT THROW PEARLS TO SWINE
I KNOW HOW HARD THAT IS THOUGH, BUT IT MUST BE DONE LOL
EDUCATORS AND THE WELL EDUCATED SEEK TO SHARE WHAT THEY KNOW
BU BRIBBLERS AND RUM SHOP ATTENDEES JUST ATTACK ATTACK ATACK BUT CAN NOT ADD MUCH OF SUBSTANCE HERE
LET ME SAY IT FOR THE ATTACKERS
STEUPSE
THE LEVEL OF MORALE IS SO LOW IN BIM THAT SOME ARE HARPING AT A WIN OF AN AWARD AT A RUM SHOW AND CONTEST
HAVE WE NOT BEEN MAKING GOOD RUM FOR AGES (I CANT SAY AS I HAVE NEVER GOT INTO RUMDRINKING)
SO THEN WHY WOULD YOU NOT WIN RUM COMPETIONS JUST AS THE FLOWER SOCIETY WIN AT CHELSEA ANNUALLY?
The blogmaster invites you to join the discussion.