By ALEXANDREA
BAILEY
editor@portisabelsouthpadre.
Jerrod Leon Henry is behind the Rio Grande Distillery in Port Isabel.
He initially arrived in this Gulf Coast community by tuna boat after what he described as being booted out of his home state for doing what he does best – making and selling liquor. His life had many journeys in store for him, but he always ended up back in Port Isabel, by fate or maybe luck.
Growing up in the Ozarks
Henry was born in Bootheel, Missouri in 1973. He is a middle child with four siblings. At age three, his family moved east into the Ozark Mountains, near Branson, where he was raised. Henry says it’s since grown exponentially.
He reminisced on simpler times in Branson, sharing a party line, adjusting the rooftop TV antenna to catch one of the two available channels, the outhouse at his grandparent’s rock home, and his father drawing water from a well.
Henry has a fine attitude about not having much while being reared. He says he spent an inordinate of time in the woods, entertaining himself by doing things “country boys do,” which included plenty of hunting and fishing.
“The old man used to give me three bullets and a 22 and say ‘Come back with something,’ so I learned to be an effective shot,” said Henry.
Henry’s family lived in North Arkansas for a brief period, near Bull Shoals. According to Henry, at the time, many of the counties in the area were dry, meaning no alcohol could be sold there, legally.
“You had to go over two counties – Baxter County – to be able to buy beer,” said Henry. “So, a lot of people bootlegged it – buy it there, bring it in, and then sell it out of the house.”
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