Who is Nathan Green? AKA "Uncle Nearest" Green?
Uncle Nearest was the first known African-American master distiller. Born in Maryland around 1820, we dont know if he was born into slavery or later became a slave, but what we do know is sometime around the mid-1800s, he began working on the farm of a country preacher and distiller in Lincoln County. Nearest was a skilled distiller, specializing in a process that gave his whiskey a unique smoothness, known as sugar maple charcoal filtering. 
In the mid-1850s, a young white boy came to work at the farm where Nearest operated as the master distiller. As the years went by, the young boy continued learning from Nearest and eventually became old enough to begin selling this unique whiskey in other towns near Lynchburg. Following the civil war, once Nearest was a free man, the white chore boy-turned business man partnered with the preacher in the distillery, and renamed the distillery after himself; his legal name was Jasper Newton, those of us in Lynchburg know him as Uncle Jack, the rest of the world knows him as Jack Daniel.
 
You can read more about her story HERE