George T Stagg Releases and Proofs

George T Stagg releases happen once per year, usually in the Fall. They are always a high-proof, uncut-unfiltered barrel proof bourbon and their grand reputation has made them highly sought after, and since they are an allocated bourbon, it is difficult to get one at any price, let alone at MSRP.

Geroge T Stagg is also part of the Buffalo Trace Antique Collection which also includes Sazerac Rye 18 Year-Old, Wiliam Larue Weller, Thomas H. Hand, and Eagle Rare 17 Year-Old.

George T. Stagg the man was born in 1835 in Lancaster, Kentucky. In 1861 he enlisted in the Union Army during the Civil War and eventually attained the rank of Captain.

After the war, Stagg became a whiskey salesman in St. Louis, and as fortune would have it, during a worldwide economic turndown, he had the funds to be able to help E. H. Taylor, Jr. out of a tight spot with his O.F.C. Distillery (Old Fire & Copper). For his financial support, Stagg became the president of Taylor’s two distilleries O.F.C. and Carlisle Distillery, and Taylor became vice president of the company, with Stagg owning 3,448 of 5,000 shares and Taylor owning the remaining 1552 shares.

They worked together for six years at which point E. H. Taylor, Jr. was tired of working with Stagg and was looking for a way out. In exchange for Taylor’s shares, Stagg offered to help him start a separate distillery of his own that became known as Old Taylor Distillery.

In 1812 the first US distillery was constructed by Harrison Blanton. In 1870 E. H. Taylor purchased it and gave it its first name, the O.F.C. (Old Fire & Copper) Distillery. After Stagg purchased the distillery, in 1890 the O.F.C. company was renamed as George T. Stagg and Co, but the distillery kept the O.F.C. name until in 1904 the distillery name was officially changed to George T. Stagg. And lastly, in August of 1999, the George T. Stagg Distillery was renamed the Buffalo Trace Distillery. Buffalo Trace released its first bottle of George T. Stagg Bourbon in 2002 and has released one every year since then except for 2021 when they felt that they didn’t have one that met their standards.