When the product was introduced in 1870. bottles of Old Forester were sealed as a way to guard against adulteration and substitution of the contents, and were initially sold in pharmacies as a medicinal product. The innovation introduced with Old Forester was not that it was available in such bottles, but that it was the first bourbon to be exclusively available in this fashion – providing a greater level of assurance of quality for that brand relative to other products in the market. This innovation was enabled and further fueled by emerging advances in the mass production of glass bottles, such as those soon to be developed by Michael Owens. The sealed bottle approach was popular with doctors and with the pharmacists that sold the product, and their approval was touted in advertisements of the product to the general public.

Originally, the product name was spelled “Old Forrester”, with a double “r”. The product is reported to have been named after a physician Dr. William Forrester who endorsed its consumption, and the renaming is conjectured to have been a way to avoid direct reference to the physician’s name. Originally formed by George Garvin Brown and his half-brother John Thompson Street Brown (J.T.S. Brown, who would also later figure into the history of the Four Roses Distillery and inspire the naming of a brand of bourbon produced by Heaven Hill Distilleries), the company that produces the product was originally registered as J. T. S. Brown & Bro., and became Brown–Forman in 1902 after several partnerships and name changes involving partners James Thompson (who was also involved in the Glenmore Distillery Company and created the Old Thompson brand), Henry Chambers, and George Forman. George Garvin Brown became sole owner by 1902, and although Brown–Forman is now a publicly traded company on the New York Stock Exchange, the Brown family still controls more than 70% of the voting shares (as of 2010).

To produce his Old Forester product, Brown would initially purchase whiskies from distillers such as John McDougal Atherton and Ben Mattingly, and blend them together. In 1902, he then purchased Mattingly’s distillery in the town of Saint Mary in Marion County, Kentucky.

Until Prohibition in the United States began in 1920, Old Forester was the leading brand produced by Brown’s company. The company was granted one of the few government licenses to produce medical whiskey, at which time the product became a straight bourbon at 100 proof (previously it had been a blended product).

Since then, other brands were acquired by the company, such as Early Times (purchased in 1923, which became America’s best-selling bourbon and maintained high sales for 30 years), and Jack Daniel’s (purchased in 1956 and as of 2007 the best-selling whiskey of any kind in the world), have become its leading products.

In August 2016, Old Forester announced the release of its 115-proof “1920 Prohibition Style Bourbon”. In 2021, the company announced its latest expression, known as the 117 Series, or the “High Angels’ Share”