By Bob Ellis

Piedmont Distillers, Madison , NC , the only legal Distiller in North Carolina , and NASCAR driving legend Junior Johnson have joined forces and introduced the company’s second moonshine product, Junior Johnson’s Midnight Moon. Johnson is now part owner of Piedmont Distillers.

“I am really proud to own part of this company,” says Johnson. “I’ve done a lot of things in my life, and my history in the moonshine business is no secret. Back in the old days, we learned to drive cars fast because we’d go to jail if we didn’t. Now you can buy part of a moonshine business, tell everybody where you can buy the product and it’s all legal. It’s a different deal then it was back then.”

Having Junior Johnson involved in Piedmont Distillers has been amazing,” states Joe Michalek , president of Piedmont Distillers. Junior had really jumped into the heart of this business and is taking part in every aspect of our product. He’s truly a legend, not only in NASCAR, but also in the moonshine trade. Our business is a lot different than it was in the early days, but the desire to produce a quality product that taste’s great remains unchanged.”

Junior Johnson’s Midnight Moon follows the Johnson family’s generations old tradition of making moonshine. Every batch is born in an authentic, copper still and is hand-crafted in small batches. Midnight Moon is triple distilled to provide the highest quality, premium moonshine available.

After mastering his driving skills in the Carolina hills running moonshine for his father, Junior began his racing career in 1955, winning five races that year.

Junior’s racing career was cut short though as he was arrested while working at his father’s moonshine still in 1956. He was sentenced and served 11 months in prison. He returned to NASCAR in 1958 and never looked back. He won a total of 50 races as a driver in his career.

Johnson eventually hung up his driver’s helmet and put on an woner’s hat and eventually went on to earn six NASCAR Winston Cup champions as an owner with drivers Cale Yarborough and Darrell Waltrip each winning three titles. To this day Yarborough remains the only driver in NASCAR history to win 3 titles in a row.

President Reagan granted Johnson a presidential pardon in 1986 for his 1956 conviction.

“It was probably one of the biggest moments in my life,” Johnson said. “He came out of the Oval Office and gave me my pardon and talked to me for 20 or 30 minutes. … It was just a great event.”

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Editor’s Note: For more on racing legend Junior Johnson read ‘The Last American Hero’ by Tom Wolfe and for a recent article go to Edmunds Inside Line .