Bourbon, Missouri: Named for a County, Not a Drink

Bourbon, Missouri, sits on the Route Sixty-Six alignment in Crawford County, a small Ozark town whose name draws puzzled looks from travelers expecting a distillery. The origin of the name is disputed: one account ties it to Bourbon County, Kentucky, itself named for the French royal house of Bourbon, while another says it refers to bourbon whiskey. The town developed around the railroad and later Route Sixty-Six, serving as a minor service stop between Sullivan and Cuba on the Ozark crossing.

Crawford County sits in the heart of the Missouri Ozarks, a karst landscape of cave systems, losing streams, and spring-fed rivers. Bourbon is close to the Onondaga Cave State Park, one of the larger publicly accessible cave systems in Missouri, and the nearby Meramec River is a popular recreation river.