Crown Royal was created for the 1939 royal visit of King George VI and Queen Elizabeth to Canada.
The whisky was developed by Samuel Bronfman, head of the Seagram Company, as a gift for the visiting monarchs. The name referred to the crown and the royal occasion, and the first bottles were presented during the couple’s Canadian tour.
Crown Royal is a Canadian whisky brand now known especially for its distinctive bottle-shaped packaging and purple cloth bag. The brand’s whisky is produced at the Gimli distillery in Manitoba, while blending and other operations have changed over its long history.
The 1939 visit was historically significant because it was the first reigning British monarch’s tour of Canada. The royal association helped establish Crown Royal as a major Canadian whisky, but the brand is not itself a designation for every whisky made in Canada.