By MELISSA DASSRATH Sunday, November 22 2009

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Head Charger George Vincent coopers a rum cask in Angostura....

A walk through the Angostura compound treats the senses to the sticky sweet scent of molasses and the spicy aroma of its famous bitters. Past the warehouses and industrial inner workings of this rum factory, there is a site that will transport one back to a unique period in human history when everything was carefully crafted by hand, to perfection.

The House of Angostura is a company rich with tradition. It is one of the only companies that still cherishes the art of coopering. Cooperage is the traditional trade of making wooden staved, conical-shaped casks and binding them together with steel rings.

Oak wood is imported from the United States, Spain, Finland, England and France. The oak is precisely cut into connecting pieces and is charred on the inside. The woodsy oak and the charring add a depth of complexity to the rum. The oak also allows air to flow inside the cask to the contents and aids in maturing the rum. Often, the oak wood has already been used once for curing whiskey and this adds an additional dimension of flavour to the rum.

The steel rings are also imported from the US and Europe. The rings are hammered around the wooden staves to set them in place and “heads” of dowelled wood seal off the top and bottom of the barrels. A powerful machine called a “driver” tightens the rings, so they do not slip when the barrels swell with the rum.

Though the need and appreciation for coopering has faded, Angostura employs nine coopers on a full time basis and churns out 120 rum barrels a day. The Corporate Communications Officer of Angostura Limited, Giselle Laronde-West, explained to Sunday Newsday that the company is committed to preserving a craft that has its roots in our colonial history.

“Coopering is a total art,” Laronde-West noted. “There is the whole antiquity of it. Rum is tied to our heritage. Plus, we feel that when working with a human being, you can get something precise and skillfully fashioned. It keeps the coopers, who are keeping this trade alive, in business.”

The Head Charger Cooper at Angostura is George Vincent. He said that while he was working in the Fernandez factory, he heard about an opening for a cooper. “A supervisor I was working with in Fernandez told me that they were looking for a cooper, but I did not know what a cooper was. I was trained by the head cooper in Fernandez. He taught me everything there is to know about coopering. About building the barrels, driving the barrels and repairing the barrels.”

Vincent has been working as a cooper for about 33 years and he explained that coopering has changed somewhat over time. There is no longer the painful process of chipping the wood by hand and putting the pieces of the puzzle together and cleverly filling in any spaces with the delicate skin of the fig tree. Nowadays, the staves are measured and sawed to specification and fit together smoothly.

However, you will not see power tools in a coopering shed. The old fashioned tools like a chisel, hammer and adze are suitable for the delicate job. Vincent said that the only skill in coopering is patience and a willingness to learn and work with one’s hands. Vincent does not believe that barrels have outlived their purpose.

He says, “It’s an old skill and the tradition of using barrels in rum making adds that special touch to the finished product. Barrels have a purpose. To get what you want out of the rum, you cannot age it in plastic, ceramic or aluminum.”

David James has been working as a cooper for 12 years with Angostura. According to him, when the casks are completed they are placed in a filler and filled with water to check for leaks. If all is well, the rum barrels are filled with raw alcohol in the form of High Proof Liquor (HPL), corked and left to cure. The rum is left to age for different periods depending on what kind of rum is desired, whether white or dark.

Laronde-West noted noted that rustic rum casks are an important ingredient in the manufacturing of rum: “The element of the oak barrels lends well to the blend of the rum. The charring and ageing also adds to the quality of the rum.”

She said that the charm of the barrels and the human touch are in keeping with Angostura’s promise of delivering an intensely unique rum. “Angostura is very proud that we are keeping this tradition and we have coopers contributing to the manufacturing of our rum. And we are pleased to give our customers something extra.”