Old Forester Distilling Co.

Old Forester is the bourbon brand that essentially invented sealed-bottle bourbon. In 1870, the pharmaceutical salesman George Garvin Brown started bottling his whiskey in sealed glass — the first bourbon sold exclusively this way, a radical move at a time when whiskey was almost universally sold by the barrel and adulterated at every step of the distribution chain. Brown's bet that the brand on the bottle could guarantee quality launched Brown–Forman Corporation, which still controls the brand 155 years later, and still bottles Old Forester continuously: the only bourbon to remain in production under the same brand name before, during, and after Prohibition. The "during Prohibition" qualifier is the loud one. When the Volstead Act shut down American distilling in 1920, Brown–Forman received one of only six licenses authorizing lawful bourbon production for medicinal purposes. The brand survived the dry years intact and emerged in 1933 with a customer base, a supply chain, and a label nobody else could claim. The distillation happens at Brown-Forman's Shively facility outside Louisville, but the visitor experience lives in downtown Louisville at the Old Forester Distilling Co. on Whisky Row — a working distillery, cooperage demonstration, and visitor center occupying the brand's original 1882–1919 building on West Main Street, restored and reopened to the public in 2018. It's one of the few Kentucky distillery experiences that puts you inside a historic urban building rathe…