(gentle music) - [Announcer] Funding for "Off 90" is provided in part by the Minnesota Arts and Cultural Heritage Fund and the citizens of Minnesota.

(loon calling) (upbeat music) - Cruising your way next "Off 90", we go to Faribault to visit a distillery.

We browse an art gallery in Rochester, and we learn about education for the deaf and blind in Faribault.

It's all just ahead, "Off 90."

(upbeat music) Hi, I'm Barbara Keith.

Thanks for joining me on this trip "Off 90."

They learned their craft at a place called Moonshine University in Kentucky.

Now they have their own distillery housed in a 100-year-old furniture factory in Faribault.

The 10,000 Drops Distillery makes a variety of craft spirits.

Let's drink it in.

(upbeat music) - By an act of Congress, you can make bourbon in any of the 50 states.

I just can't call it Kentucky bourbon, but yes, it's bourbon.

(upbeat music) - We're in one of the most heavily-regulated industries in the country.

You gotta be kind of crazy to do it.

No one really gives you an instruction manual.

- The barrel takes control, and it's like little time capsules up there.

I'm Rob Kruckoski.

I am a distiller of craft spirits.

(upbeat music) We, you know, I learned the basics, a lot of books, a lot of practicing, but we did take a lot of classes down in, it's called Moonshine University down in Louisville, Kentucky.

Bourbon just needs to be made in the states.

It needs to be aged in new oak barrels, new every time, and contain at least 51% corn, no more than 80, and distilled from an all grain mash, and entered into a barrel at no more than 125 proof.

And that's bourbon.

(upbeat music) - We initially thought that we could do this business for like $60,000, and we'd have it up and running in like three months, and the reality was about four years and almost a million dollars.

And about two of those years is just working on licensing.

So you need to get your federal distilled spirits permit, or DSP.

That process can take up to a year just to get that through.

And that's the first key to unlocking the other six permits (chuckling) that you need to do.

So it takes a lot to get here.

I am Jake Hvistendahl.

Technically I'm the chief manager, but that really just means I do a lot of stuff.

(laughs) No one really gives you an instruction manual on any of the equipment, so we're getting great equipment from great American manufacturers, and then we gotta figure out how to put it together and how to run it and all that.

Our initial business plan, we scrapped like five or six of 'em really fast.

You know, you put out a product that you think is great and the market may not agree with you, or only a few people do, or it just isn't a great selling category, so you need to be able to put out something else quickly to keep your business going.

And COVID was a good example of that.

We ended up launching a vodka line the weekend of the shutdown.

(laughs) And thankfully, our local vodkas is a price-competitive budget brand, which ended up doing well while everyone was locked in their homes.

It's been good.

(gentle upbeat music) - I started distilling in Pennsylvania about 10 years ago.

Five-gallon little copper still, started making spirits out of vanilla-flavored corn syrup.

It was a bit harsh, but you know, I was excited and proud of it, and eventually evolved into all grain mashes and a lot better whiskeys and rums.

That slowly evolved into more of a passion, and then myself, Jake, and our third partner, Pat, all got laid off around the same time, and we just had the right mix of skills, from running a business, to running a bar, to the understanding of making spirits, just that skillset helped build this place.

So our brand of bourbon is 10,000 Drops.

It'll be a four-year bourbon.

The process involves picking the right grains, really good grains, and then best practice all the way through cooking, fermentation, distillation.

We started mashing in the corn, which is cooking as we speak, and then we'll mash in our wheat.

We do a wheated bourbon.

There's other flavors, you know, flavoring grains like rye.

You can use quinoa, you can use oats.

As long as it's a cereal grain, you can use it.

So when a fermentation is done fermenting, we take that, which is around nine to 10% alcohol by volume, and we'll just strip that out in the still, just all the alcohol will be taken out, in which we've done that already, and those are called low wines.

They don't taste good, they don't look that great, and then tomorrow, what we call the spirit run, we'll put all those in the still and do our second distillation where we make the cuts, clean it up, make it taste really nice, and then proof it and get it ready for barreling, where it'll spend four to 10 years resting in our rickhouse upstairs.

Heavier toasts can bring out darker fruits and cherries, down to your medium to lighter toasts, caramels, vanillas, more the delicate flavors Entry proof also has an influence on that.

Bourbon can go in a barrel no higher than 125 proof, no lower than 80, and those different concentrations of alcohol can extract different flavors from the barrel.

And again, it's four years to figure out if you've done that right, so it's kind of steer that ship after four years, like maybe we should do it this way, and then it's another four years or so until you you can see what the results of those changes were.

Bourbon is America's only native spirit, and bourbon has to go into a new oak charred barrel every time, American white oak, and bourbon that just imparts just a very in your face, powerful flavors.

It's oaky.

They say you can get 200 different flavors out of a barrel, from chocolates, to toffees, to caramels, vanillas, grassy notes, you name it.

All that happens in those years it spends in that barrel.

And we clocked it perfectly.

The whole process is three cooks, which yields about 750 gallons of mash that we distill twice, which is about 1,500 pounds of grain just to fill one of our 53-gallon barrels.

So it's a big process.

- A lot of great things have come out of being here in Faribault.

We found some amazing farmers.

Crosswinds Farm is just five or six miles down the road.

Not only do they grow the grain that we use to make our bourbon and our whiskey, they take everything back at the end of the process.

We get to be in this amazing location, because Faribault looks at us as something that can help improve the community versus something that needs to get put back in a garage somewhere where it's hard to find.

- A lot of the things you see in here were salvage materials from the antique shop, ranging from the the Northfield County Jail door to the back bar which used to be at the Hurry Back here in Faribault.

- Sprinkler pipes used for railing, flooring was put up on the ceiling.

All the joists we cut out, we turned into our bar and our space like that, so just being resourceful and using what you have has been really important to us.

- Craft distilleries are, I think it's important.

They're doing a lot of small batch things that you can't get in larger distilleries, just really unique products.

Our earliest release will be a four-year bourbon, which will be coming out this October.

It's been a long time in the making, so we wanna do it justice.

(upbeat music) (upbeat jazzy music) - Gallery 24 in Rochester is a nonprofit artist collaborative bringing artists together from around the area.

It's named after the 24 artists who founded it and features classes and exhibits.

Let's browse their creative gallery.

(gentle upbeat music) - My name is Anne Thiemann.

I'm the president of the board of directors for Gallery 24, a nonprofit gallery outside of downtown Rochester, Minnesota.

The gallery was founded in 2017.

It's called Gallery 24 because there were 24 founding members who were there from the beginning and were inspired by each other to go from just a classroom setting into a sales setting.

We're an artist collaborative with about 30 artists right now.

Our purpose is to bring artists together, improve each other with help and communications through art, and be a part in the community, to teach some classes, and have exhibits of local and regional artists.

The location is right on Broadway, and I like that it has parking that you don't have to go to a parking ramp and walk three blocks.

It's nice and has big windows so we can can display stained glass and 3D art in the windows.

Our gallery, we are all local artists from around maybe 50 miles around Rochester, and we love what we do.

- We wanna stay here.

(laughs) We're a group of artists.

This is our passion.

This is our fun.

We'd like to be able to stay, and we'd like to be able to continue and provide Rochester with that opportunity.

- [Anne] We loved to do art, and our art got too much to just do it as a hobby, so then we started to hope that we can sell it.

- I'm Ivete Martinez, and my work is oil.

I think it's the texture.

We don't get that in acrylics.

The other thing is the values.

You can go from one value to another, you can change colors pretty well, and the pigment hold it for long time.

The pigment is so bright, so beautiful.

- And most of us are now selling.

I mean, not every month, but over the term of the year, everybody who is in here sold things.

It's all price ranges in here.

And some are emerging artists, and we promote that.

We have student art shows.

- If I are under pressure, I do work fast, because when I go to the zone, when I zone in the zone, everything's appear.

I have to have an alarm.

If I don't have an alarm, forget it.

I'm painting, you know?

- I really like just seeing all this stuff come in when we change out our art.

Loving to see the people's new stuff.

It's fun to ask'em how they came up with it or how they worked it out, or just the creative process that they went through.

I think, "Oh, I wouldn't have used those color combinations," or "That's really interesting that they could come up with something that I haven't seen before."

It's fun to see what other people, their creative process, how it works for them.

- It gives me a warm feeling when somebody looks at my art, but sometimes I come in and go, "Oh, what should I do?"

And I don't have any inspiration.

And I look at a painting, or at flowers, and then all in a sudden the colors I will use in my next pieces come together.

So I get, as an artist myself, get inspiration from other artists.

- For me, it's fantastic, because it's very interesting how a new member come into a community.

You know, first you're a teammate, you're not very expressive, you worry of doing the right thing, but slowly, you get involved more and more.

And as you get involved, you assume more responsibility.

You build up within a community, you know?

And that's very good.

I like being part of the gallery.

And I like also to be on the board with the girls, and (laughing), yes, and the best thing is that we are doing different in this gallery.

All the galleries are kind of passive, you know?

We are different.

We vision the future of this gallery being very active in the community, and we want the community to participate in our gallery actively.

- Last year we started to have monthly exhibits, and last year it was eight or nine.

So we had different themes, a water theme, a winter theme, a flower theme, and this year we had an abstract exhibit that just ended.

Normally six weeks to eight weeks before we send out a call for artists, and most of the artists are non-members of the gallery, so it involves the community.

And then we have an opening reception, and it will hang in the gallery and be able to be seen by the public, and say around normally four weeks.

It's real fun.

We look at the art together, we argue what colors are our favorites, and sometimes somebody says, "Oh, I don't like the style, but the colors are great."

- This year we are more organized.

It's that we have a sequence of theme exhibition who are not just for the members, who brings people that have never been a member to exhibit with no cost.

- Come on down.

We've got such a variety.

We've got so many price points.

We can go from little to high.

We've got anything that can fit on little spaces, big spaces, and in between.

(gentle upbeat music) - The Minnesota State Academy for the Deaf and the Minnesota State Academy for the Blind are in two separate campuses in Faribault, but they share the same mission, to empower every student to thrive in the world and to realize each student's full potential.

Let's learn more.

(gentle upbeat music) - [Interpreter] Standing in a room does not make a person included.

- As many different kids we have, there's that many different needs.

- [Interpreter] It may be far for some families, but it actually brings the families closer in the end.

My name is Terry Wilding.

I am the superintendent of the Minnesota State Academies.

(gentle upbeat music) We have a school for the blind and a school for the deaf.

We are similar in certain services, schools, instruction, what their needs are, to make sure that families are included in the community and the school environment.

Why we have separate campuses and separate instruction is the approach is very different.

For our deaf school, we approach things in a visual manner.

Concepts are in sign and is a visual language to make it fully accessible.

In the blind education system, they educate in a very different way.

It's very auditory, it's very sensory.

It's a different approach.

The philosophy behind that is we provide the full accessibility and environment for both campuses to cover all of those needs.

(gentle upbeat music) Here at the Minnesota State Academies, we are one of the oldest public vicinities in the state of Minnesota.

In 1858, the state legislature established this school.

Of course, at that time, it was the Civil War and things were happening.

We did not open our doors until 1863.

In 1866, we split schools.

We erected the school for the blind and the school for the deaf.

We've been serving deaf and hard of hearing and blind and visually impaired students since that time.

We provide different activities, making sure that our students develop their success in their career here at school.

(students clapping) In the United States, deaf students are typically put into large school systems, where they are alone or in a small group within a bigger school district.

Often, their services, and access, and support is limited by the availability of people around them.

Here at this school, we provide students with a functional level, full accessibility to information and different activities in and outside of the classroom.

We provide for the whole child development.

We've become self independent.

They're worthwhile adults, and they're successful in their lives.

This is a place where it becomes their second home to many students.

This is their family.

They develop their skills, their thinking, their academics, their communication so they can go back to their home families and develop stronger relationships with them.

Here we provide many things for our children.

- [Speaker] Good morning, everyone.

Thank you for coming today to witness our special event of eighth grade graduation.

- [Interpreter] We have a variety of students.

Students come to us with full language, full communication at home.

We focus on their academics.

Sometimes we have students that have very little accessibility at home.

They've grown up with no language.

We adapt our instruction to match what their current level is and build upon it to make it a strength.

We maximize their capabilities and their potential.

Each individual is very different.

We are a fully special ed education school.

We have education plans that are suited for each individual student, what they want in their life, and we develop that instructional approach to support their goals.

(gentle upbeat music) - In the state here, we're the only school for the blind.

We're a state school.

And what kind of sets us apart from other schools is that we are set up to provide education for visually impaired students.

All the accommodations and adaptations that they need to be successful are just part of our program.

A good example would be PE.

Typically if they're in their home district, they have to have what they call DAPE, and it's adapted PE.

They have to have special accommodations put in place.

Here, it's just part of the program.

We also can provide some of the intense training that kids, students with visual impairments need, learning braille, doing a lot of the expanded core curriculum, which means learning how to move about, orientation, mobility, working on home living skills, work skills, all kinds of skills that I as a sighted person, as I grew up, I just kind of picked up from observing that a visually impaired student does not.

They need that direct hands on instruction to pick up those things.

Otherwise, you know, they're at home, food just appears in front of 'em.

They had no idea what the process was.

They need that direct instruction.

- One, two, three!

- Yay!

- Smile!

- We have typically around 50 to 55 students on campus.

That's serving about, probably about 10 to 12% of the total identified students in the state that's visually impaired, but as many different kids we have, there's that many different needs.

There's some basic stuff that they all kind of need.

The amount of vision they have varies.

Typically there's other health issues that may be going on with their visual impairment.

A lot of our kids have physical needs as well, so it's just a huge range, and it's different every day.

(woman singing) One of our music therapists here is Jennifer Pelletier, and the exciting thing is this year she started doing a braille music class with some of the older students.

It's a challenge, but like everybody else in the world, we all have challenges, and we're here to help them be prepared to meet those challenges.

- [Interpreter] Inclusion means being involved in the public school system, inclusion in the home environment.

But you forget that if we do not provide enough supports or enough accessibility, that person really isn't included.

Standing in a room does not make a person included, making sure that they have full accessibility to information, language, and the environment.

This place may look like it's separate from that, but we are actually more inclusive than a public school.

Our language, our identity, our confidence, all is grown here so they can feel more connected to their families and their home and their community.

It's really key to understand that this school may be far for some families, but it actually brings the families closer in the end.

- [Interpreter 2] The more you know, the more you do, you gain so much knowledge.

- [Interpreter] For myself, I grew up deaf, in a deaf family.

My experience was a lot of oppression, limitations put on me when I was in the public realm.

Being able to change the world to make sure that we remove those barriers for individuals.

I've seen many things change, technologies, statutes, laws, awareness, media representation, movies, actors in those movies.

The world is changing for the better for the deaf and other disability groups.

I hope that helps me when I come to work every day to support our deaf and blind students and give them that same hope.

(gentle music) - [Barbara] We've reached the end of this tour.

Thanks for riding along.

See you next time "Off 90."

(upbeat music) - [Announcer] Funding for "Off 90" is provided in part by the Minnesota Arts and Cultural Heritage Fund and the citizens of Minnesota.

(bird calling) (gentle music)