Download McIlhenny's Gold AudioBook Free
After the Civil War ended, Edmund McIlhenny, an ambitious and tenacious Louisiana businessman, found himself with few prospects. The South's economy in ruins and his huge amount of money in Confederacy currency worthless, he had no choice but to come back along with his wife, Mary, to her family home in Avery Island, a former sugar plantation destroyed by Union soldiers. To McIlhenny's surprise, however, the chile peppers he had planted before being forced off the island had flourished. In need of money, he chopped up the peppers, combined them with salt and vinegar, and produced the first batch of hot pepper sauce. He called it Tabasco.Former BusinessWeek editor Jeffrey Rothfeder tells how, from a straightforward idea-the outgrowth of three peppers planted by using an isolated island on the Gulf of Mexico-a secretive family business emerged that would produce one of the best–known brands on the planet. In short order, McIlhenny's descendants would turn Tabasco into a gold mine, so that it is as ubiquitous as Coke, Kodak, and Kleenex: an icon of pop culture. The McIlhenny Company, still run by a family of matchless characters who have confidence in a rigid code of family loyalty, clings to tradition and the old ways of doing business.
