The History of Bourbon and Kentucky Whiskey

The history of bourbon and Kentucky whiskey begins with corn grown by settlers in central Kentucky in the 1770s, long before federal rules specified bourbon’s grain and barrels.[1][12] Its development was gradual: farmers and river traders, distillers and blenders, scientists and lawmakers all helped shape what the name would mean.

Corn, settlement and the river trade

According to Kentucky Historical Marker 2295, settlers arriving in central Kentucky in the 1770s grew corn for their families and livestock, then turned surplus grain into whiskey. Many were of Scots-Irish descent and brought generations of distilling experience with them.[1]

The marker records a rapid expansion: Kentucky had 500 stills in 1792 and 2,000 by 1812. It also quotes the 1810 census as recording 128 distilleries in Bourbon County alone. These are figures reported by the historical marker, rather than a fresh examination of the census returns.[1]

Jacob Spears gives that broad history a particular route. A Bourbon County farmer and distiller, Spears sent whiskey towards New Orleans through his sons Abraham and Noah. Their flatboats travelled from Cooper’s Run down the Licking, Ohio and Mississippi rivers.[1] The route connects Kentucky’s farm distilling with a trade extending far beyond the county.

Story box: Corn whiskey takes to the rivers

Early names and uncertain firsts

Evan Williams belongs in this history, but the wording of his historical marker matters. It says the Welsh-born Williams came to Kentucky around 1780 and built a distillery on the Ohio River in 1783. Its priority claim is qualified: “It is said to have been the first commercial distillery in Kentucky”.[2]

Verdict: Disputed. The marker’s qualified claim does not prove that Williams was Kentucky’s first distiller. The counter evidence noted in the fact sheet needs to be checked against its underlying sources before publication.[2]

The same care applies to the word bourbon. Historian Michael Veach identifies a Kentucky newspaper reference from 1821 as the first written mention, but does not name the newspaper in the article cited here.[3] It is therefore a reported finding, not a securely identified starting document for the name.

Sour mash before the famous inventor

One of the most revealing surviving objects is a handwritten recipe dated 1818. Held by the Kentucky Historical Society in the Carpenter Family Papers, it has a sour mash recipe on one side and a sweet mash recipe on the other.[4]

Verdict: Disputed. The recipe is often associated with Catherine Carpenter, but the society’s archivists state that it carries no author’s name and that Carpenter could not read or write. The attribution grew later.[4] The document is evidence for the process, not proof of who composed the instructions.

Veach explains sour mash as adding backset to the mash, creating conditions that favour yeast and inhibit spoiling bacteria. He credits Dr James C. Crow with applying scientific methods to distillation, rather than inventing the process itself.[5]

Legend verdict: Crow invented sour mash

Crow’s contribution need not disappear with the invention story. Veach records that E.H. Taylor Jr. hired a Crow-trained distiller for his OFC distillery in the 1870s, showing how technical practice could pass between people and businesses.[5]

Blending, rectifying and the question of honesty

Nineteenth-century whiskey was not simply a division between distillers and impostors. Veach describes rectifiers who bought whiskey and blended barrels into recognisable house styles, naming George Garvin Brown, Paul Jones and Isaac Wolfe Bernheim among them.[8]

Other rectifiers mixed aged whiskey with neutral spirits, caramel colouring and fruit juice, sometimes presenting the result as old bourbon.[8] The central historical question was therefore not merely whether whiskey had been blended, but whether its description told the buyer what it contained.

That argument reached the presidency. On 27 December 1909, William Howard Taft issued his decision on the meaning of whisky after a rehearing by Solicitor General Lloyd Bowers generated more than 1,200 printed pages of evidence.[6]

Verdict: Documented. Taft found that the US Pure Food Act of 1906 did not mention whisky or authorise officials to establish its standard. His decision allowed whisky made from neutral spirits to remain whisky, but required identifying wording in the United States. A mixture was to be described as a blend of straight whisky and whisky made from neutral spirits.[6]

The decision set no minimum ageing period.[6] For the full dispute and its labelling distinctions, read the Taft Decision, rather than treating it as the moment today’s bourbon rules arrived complete.

When bourbon’s barrel rule became federal

The Federal Alcohol Administration Act, approved on 29 August 1935, supplied the authority under which federal standards of identity developed.[11] The decisive barrel wording appears in a 1938 amendment to Regulations No. 5.[12]

Verdict: Documented. The US amendment defined bourbon whiskey as distilled at no more than 80% ABV (160 US proof) from a mash containing at least 51% corn. For bourbon produced on or after 1 March 1938, it required storage in charred new oak containers.[12]

This distinction separates historical practice from a legal requirement. It does not mean charred barrels were first used in 1938. It means the amendment made charred new oak a condition for bourbon produced from the specified date.[12]

A short documentary timeline

Prohibition and the medicinal whiskey trade need their own account, rather than a compressed explanation here. American whiskey during Prohibition follows that interruption and the question of what survived.

Bottles, people and a changing public identity

Kentucky’s later whiskey history includes changes in presentation as well as production. T. William Samuels bought the Loretto distillery property later associated with Maker’s Mark on 1 October 1953; its historical marker dates the first bottling to 1958.[13]

Verdict: Documented. Veach credits Samuels with a wheated bourbon recipe and Margie Samuels with the bottle design, hand-printed labels and wax seal.[14]

Verdict: Documented. In 1984, Elmer T. Lee created Blanton’s. The University of Kentucky describes it as the first single-barrel bourbon sold commercially.[15] That priority claim is the university’s account, not the result of an independent market survey.

Verdict: Documented. Senate Resolution 294, agreed on 2 August 2007, recognised bourbon as “America’s Native Spirit” and designated September 2007 National Bourbon Heritage Month.[16] Its preamble incorrectly attributes the phrase to Congress in 1964. It was a Senate resolution, not a new production standard.

Verdict: Documented. The Kentucky Distillers’ Association reported 2.7 million visitors to the Kentucky Bourbon Trail in 2025. Its April 2026 report also gave nearly 70 participating destinations and said about 80% of visitors came from outside Kentucky.[9] These figures do not establish the number of distinct individuals or count all Kentucky distilleries.

Where to go next

• American Whiskey During Prohibition: What Survived and Why: follow the interruption and survival of the trade.
• The Taft Decision of 1909: What Is Whiskey?: examine the argument over identity and labelling.
• Enslaved Workers and Black Distillers in American Whiskey History: broaden the account of the people behind American whiskey.

Sources

[1] Kentucky Historical Society, ExploreKYHistory. Bourbon Whiskey / Jacob Spears, Historical Marker 2295, undated. https://explorekyhistory.ky.gov/items/show/427

[2] Kentucky Historical Society. Evan Williams (1755 to 1810), Historical Marker 2445, undated. https://history.ky.gov/markers/evan-williams-1755-1810

[3] Michael R. Veach. New Orleans and Bourbon, 20 March 2023. https://bourbonveach.com/2023/03/20/new-orleans-and-bourbon/

[4] Kentucky Historical Society, Kentucky Ancestors Online. Cheri Daniels and Deana Thomas, The Sour Mash Whiskey Recipe of Catherine Carpenter, undated. https://history.ky.gov/kentucky-ancestors/the-sour-mash-whiskey-recipe-of-catherine-carpenter

[5] Michael R. Veach. Early Sour Mash, 9 July 2018. https://bourbonveach.com/2018/07/09/early-sour-mash/

[6] William Howard Taft, via The American Presidency Project, University of California, Santa Barbara. Decision on the Meaning of the Term “Whisky” Under the Pure Food Act and the Proper Regulations for Branding Various Kinds of Whisky Under the Internal Revenue Act, 27 December 1909. https://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/node/367051

[8] Michael R. Veach. Rectifiers in the 19th Century, 23 May 2022. https://bourbonveach.com/2022/05/23/rectifiers-in-the-19th-century/

[9] Kentucky Distillers’ Association. Kentucky Bourbon Trail visitation holds strong at 2.7 million hosted in 2025, 7 April 2026. https://kybourbon.com/?p=11730

[11] Federal Register, volume 89, number 243. TTB final rule on standards of identity, 18 December 2024, footnote 1 and statutory authority discussion. https://govinfo.gov/content/pkg/FR-2024-12-18/html/2024-29938.htm

[12] Federal Register, volume 3, number 42. Treasury Department, Federal Alcohol Administration Division, Regulations No. 5, Amendment No. 5, 2 March 1938. https://archives.federalregister.gov/issue_slice/1938/3/2/561-563.pdf

[13] Kentucky Historical Society, ExploreKYHistory. Old Grist Mill and Distillery, Historical Marker 1509, undated. https://explorekyhistory.ky.gov/items/show/264

[14] Michael R. Veach. Kentucky’s Great Distilleries: Maker’s Mark, Setting the Bar for the 21st Century, 23 July 2018. https://bourbonveach.com/2018/07/23/kentuckys-great-distilleries-makers-mark-setting-the-bar-for-the-21st-century/

[15] University of Kentucky, Pigman College of Engineering. Elmer T. Lee, Hall of Distinction, undated. https://engr.uky.edu/recognitions/elmer-t-lee

[16] US Government Publishing Office. S. Res. 294, 110th Congress, agreed to in the Senate on 2 August 2007. https://www.govinfo.gov/content/pkg/BILLS-110sres294ats/html/BILLS-110sres294ats.htm

This desk-researched article uses the supplied verified fact sheet, distinguishing historical documents, institutional accounts and attributed historical interpretation.

Last checked: November 2026