POND FORK Bourbon, Built for the Blending Trade in 1893, Is Available to Consumers for the First Time in Its History

Corning & Company revives the trade-only straight bourbon once sold exclusively to blenders, now bottled as a 50/50 blend of pot-distilled and column-distilled bourbon at 93 proof.

ROHNERT PARK, Calif. — October 2026 — Corning & Company today announced the consumer launch of POND FORK Bourbon Whiskey, originally produced by the company in Peoria, Illinois, in 1893.

POND FORK existed only as a trade product, sold to blenders, rectifiers and wholesale houses who used it to build and improve their own whiskeys. It was never sold to the public. With this release, consumers can buy a bottle of POND FORK for the first time.

A Bourbon Built for the Trade

At the turn of the 20th century, Kentucky dominated the production of sour mash bourbon. Corning & Company, established in Peoria in 1846 and at the time the largest producer of spirits in the United States, set out to prove that mastery was not confined to one state. Equipped with traditional mash tubs and charge stills, the firm developed POND FORK as a high-grade sour mash bourbon suited to blending, built to meet the trade's demand for body, consistency and uniform character.

The name POND FORK was drawn from the language of Appalachian creek country, evoking clear water and honest character. POND FORK remained a mainstay of the Corning & Company portfolio until the onset of Prohibition. Its history survives in original labels, trade journal references and family-preserved examples of the original product.

Two Methods. One Bourbon.

The revived POND FORK honors its blending origins with a production approach that is rare in American whiskey. Each bottle combines 50% pot-distilled straight bourbon from Corning & Company with 50% column-distilled Kentucky straight bourbon. The pot still contributes texture, weight and complexity. The column still contributes structure, clarity and consistency. Blended in equal proportion and aged a minimum of four years, the two create a layered straight bourbon that neither method produces alone. POND FORK is bottled at 93 proof, high enough to hold its own in an Old Fashioned or Manhattan and gentle enough to enjoy neat or over a single large cube. It is produced in batches of approximately 1,000 cases.

"POND FORK was originally made for pre-Prohibition distillers and blending houses. This time around, we are bringing it to consumers," said Samuel D. Long, CEO, Corning & Company. "The people who tasted it 100 years ago knew exactly what it could do. Now, for the first time, everyone else gets to find out."

Heritage Without Pretense

POND FORK's story doesn't depend on frontier legend or an invented founding family. It rests on the documented record of an independent industrial distiller in Peoria, Illinois — a city once known as a capital of American whiskey — that competed on quality rather than geography. That same directness defines the modern brand: a bourbon that says plainly what it is and is made to do exactly that. "There is plenty of mythology in bourbon. We didn't need to invent any," said Long. "Everything we say about POND FORK reflects our stewardship of its history. It's the bourbon a blender reached for in 1893, and we think it's a bourbon we will all be proud to pour today."