In a $16 billion deal this week, Japanese beverage giant Suntory announced it plans to purchase Beam Inc., the maker of Jim Beam bourbon and the owner of other popular bourbon brands like Maker's Mark.
Those and most other bourbons are made in Kentucky, and the deal has some hoping the drink's growth in the global market won't come at the expense of its uniquely Kentucky heritage.
For more than a century, Suntory has been in the beer and spirits industry in Japan, but what many Americans think of when they hear the name is the scene from the 2003 film Lost in Translation, in which
