The Story of How Moonshiners Became a TV Show

The Discovery Channel docudrama “Moonshiners” began its seventh season this month. The reality television show follows a diverse group of people living in the Appalachian Mountains as they continue their families’ two hundred year old tradition of making moonshine. The show has had its share of controversy, mostly because it follows the illegal business of making liquor and selling it without including taxes. The cast of characters on “Moonshiners” have never failed to provide entertainment.

Here’s the story of how “Moonshiners” Became a TV Show.

The show

“Moonshiners” is a docudrama that follows the lives of several families who have learned and handed down the tradition of making moonshine or illegal alcohol and selling it untaxed in the Appalachian Mountains of Virginia, Tennessee, North Carolina and South Carolina. The show looks at the history of making moonshine and focuses on the life of Appalachian moonshiner legend Marvin “Popcorn” Sutton. The show also follows Steve Ray Tickle and other men as they face the law while trying to earn a living in the tradition handed down to them for two centuries. “Moonshiners” became one of the Discovery Channel’s popular “realty television shows”. In 2013, Discovery began a spinoff of the show titled “Tickle”.

Controversy

There has been much controversy surrounding “Moonshiners”. Just after Discovery aired the premier of “Moonshiners” the ABC (Alcohol Beverage Control of Virginia) requested that Discovery’s producers place a disclaimer at the beginning of each episode stating that the show was a documentation. Magilia Entertainment never did put the disclaimer in the show. Discovery continues to call “Moonshiners” a docudrama. The show does follow the tradition of the Appalachian moonshiners, and their activities are illegal, but maybe the show is simply a dramatization of what the moonshiners might be doing and it might be about how they live their lives.

How it began

“Moonshiners” was inspired by an incredibly interesting man. The idea for Discovery’s “Moonshiners” came from a series of documentaries that were filmed in the first part of the 2000’s. Documentarian Neal Hutchesen included a local resident Marvin “Popcorn” Sutton a 2002 film about the southern Appalachian dialect titled “Mountain Talk”. Hutchesen went on to make a documentary starring Sutton titled “This is the Last Dam Run of Likker I’ll Ever Make” about Sutton’s illegal moonshining business. The movie became a cult classic and got the attention of television producers in Boston and New York City.

Marvin”Popcorn” Sutton was born in the North Carolina Appalachians and spent all of his life there and in the Tennessee mountains. He carried on his family business of making and running moonshine. Sutton got his nickname when he attacked a broken popcorn machine with a pool stick in a bar. Sutton wrote and self published a guide to moonshine and self produced a video about the business. Being that making and selling moonshine is a federal offense, the feds were on to him early on. Sutton faced charges for selling untaxed liquor as early as 1974 but managed to be put on probation several times.

Despite his endearing personality and dedication to the Appalachian way of life for more than a century, Henry “Popcorn” Sutton was not able to escape the law. It didn’t help that he was so publicly candid about his business. In 2007 a fire on Sutton’s property led the police to find 650 gallons of untaxed alcohol. The following year the Federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms found more than 900 gallons of moonshine on Sutton’s properties. He was also arrested on illegal firearms charges. Despite his major legal problems, interest continued to grow in creating a regular television show about the moonshiners of Appalachia. Unfortunately, Marvin “Popcorn” Sutton took his life in 2009 instead of going to federal prison. His work and life, illegal or not, is honored in the Discovery Channel’s “Moonshiners”.