Top 10 moments in Bourbon history

War, Prohibition and technological breakthroughs have all made their mark on Bourbon, making it one of the most fascinating categories in the spirits industry.

Bourbon is one of the most fascinating categories in the spirits industry. We roundup its biggest moments in history

As with most sectors in the industry, the origins of what we now call Bourbon whiskey are hotly debated, and are never likely to be completely ascertained.

While the spirit has been created since the mid-18th Century, with its origins traced back to Scottish and Irish Medieval monks, the word Bourbon was not applied until around 1820 and is thought to have derived from Kentucky’s Bourbon County – itself named after the French royal dynasty.

A spirit which cannot be made without corn or anywhere other than the United States, Bourbon is now inextricably tied to the colours of red, white and blue.

However, while it now enjoys soaring success, the industry has endured its fair share of hardships, with production halted by momentous events such as the Civil War and 20th Century Prohibition.

So how did Bourbon achieve its current untouchable status? Click through the following pages to discover the top 10 moments in Bourbon history.

1789: Elijah Craig founds distillery

While the origins of Bourbon are highly disputed, many credit 18th Century Baptist minister and entrepreneur Elijah Craig as pioneering Bourbon distillation methods.

When Craig opened a distillery in what later became known as Woodford County in 1789, he began ageing spirits in charred oak casks. However, while some see Craig as the father of Bourbon production, many historians claim he made whiskey using the same ageing methods as his contemporaries.

The thought that Craig single-handedly invented may be no more than, as one historian claims, “charming legend”, but he was an ardent early pioneer for the sector. He has even been immortalised in Heaven Hill’s Elijah Craig Bourbon brand.

1794: Whisky Rebellion

In 1791, farmers in the western frontier region embarked on a protest against an excise tax placed on all distilled spirits to pay back debts incurred by the Revolutionary War. The duty was dubbed the Whiskey Tax due to the prevalence of the spirit in the US at the time.

Tensions culminated in 1794 when 500 angry distillers attacked the Western Pennsylvanian house of tax inspector General John Neville. In response, Washington sent 1,300 troops to suppress the insurgents and enforce collection of the tax, however most rebels dispersed before any conflict could occur. The tax remained difficult to collect and the law was repealed by Thomas Jefferson’s Republican Party.

1795: Creation of Jim Beam Bourbon

As one of the biggest Bourbon producers in the world, the creation of Jim Beam certainly warrants a spot on this list. In 1795, a family of German immigrants by the name of Beam, changed from the German name Böhm, started to sell barrels of corn whiskey in Kentucky.

In the years to come, the family of distillers moved to Nelson County and later Clermont where the James B. Beam Distilling Company was founded after Prohibition in 1935, producing Bourbon known as Jim Beam.

1823: Sour mash developed

In 1823, Scottish chemist and physician Dr James C. Crow, who moved from Scotland to Kentucky to apply his scientific methods to distillation, invented the sour mash process for creating Bourbon, a method which is now used in almost all Bourbon production.

It involves recycling an older batch of mash containing live yeast to begin the fermentation of a new batch.

1861: Civil War declared

In 1861 Civil War erupted and tore apart the main whiskey-making states of America, with some siding with the Confederate cause and others with the union.

Over the course of the war, distilleries were destroyed and their workers were killed, while an excise tax was reimposed on distilled spirits in a bid to generate more revenue for the state and its war efforts.

On the flip side, whiskey and Bourbon were massively sought after during the fighting, finding use as both a medical tool and dutch courage provider. However, it was not always easy to come by as corn was needed for food more urgently than distillation.

1920: Prohibition in the United States

In 1920, the Eighteenth Amendment was implemented in the US, outlawing the production, sale and consumption of alcohol. However, the war was widely flouted and illicit production was rife.

As America’s most popular spirits, whiskey and Bourbon were dealt fatal blows, with most businesses closing shop for the next 13 years – or legally at least.

Bourbon was by and large replaced by moonshine as the predominant drink of choice as bootleggers could not risk letting their stocks age due to the increased chance officials would discover the illicit activity.

However, a few distilleries retained their license to produce whiskey for medicinal reasons, such as Buffalo Trace, then known as the George T. Stagg Distillery. Business began to pick up once again when Prohibition was repealed in 1933, but supplies of aged whiskey were critically low and come consumers had developed a taste for unaged white spirits such as gin.

1949: Elmer T. Lee joins Buffalo Trace

Revered Blanton’s master distiller Elmer T. Lee is best known for introducing the world to single barrel Bourbon when the brand launched in 1984.

Named after the distillery president at Buffalo Trace when Lee joined the company in 1949, Blanton’s was the first single barrel Bourbon to be released to consumers, a concept Albert B. Blanton would keep for himself when privately entertaining.

Just one year after the release of Blanton’s, Lee retired from the company, but continued to make regular appearances around the distillery as an ambassador. He died last July at the age of 93.

1964: America’s national spirit

In 1964, the US Congress recognised Bourbon as a “distinctive product of the United States” and asked that the “appropriate agencies of the United States Government take appropriate action to prohibit importation into the United States of whiskey designated as ‘Bourbon Whiskey”.

And so while the spirit can legally be produced anywhere in the country (despite its historical ties to Kentucky), only whiskey made in the US using corn could be called Bourbon.

2007: Premier of Mad Men

The launch of this already iconic US TV show was a catalyst for the global resurgence in popularity of ‘retro’ or ‘vintage’ cocktails.

These mixes are an immovable presence in the glamorous lives of the show’s characters, prompting fans to order Bourbon-based cocktails such as the Old Fashioned and Mint Julep for themselves.

The male characters on the show also spurred consumers to undertake so-called “macho” drinking habits such as sipping neat Bourbon on the rocks.

Today: Craft distilling boom

The soaring popularity of craft brands in the spirits industry is no more evident than in Bourbon.

As capitalist fatigue sets in, consumers are turning to seemingly homespun brands with a story to tell and due to the prevalence of Bourbon brands which appeal to their ancestry, the industry satiates this desire.

This popularity, which extends from the US across the world, means that demand is booming, and stocks of ageing Bourbon sitting in Kentucky are now at their highest levels since the 1970s.