The county was named for Judge Alney McLean, a lawyer and politician, and was established in 1854 from parts of Daviess, Ohio, and Muhlenberg Counties. Solomon Rhoads and James Inman settled there in 1788. The first county officers were Sanders Eaves, judge; Alfred Tanner, clerk; Henry Griffith, sheriff; Frank McLean, county attorney; Jacob Davis, surveyor; and James Hinton, jailer. Calhoun was named for John Calhoun, a circuit judge and Congressman from 1835 to 1839. Formed in 1784 as Rhoadsville, it became known as Fort Vienna in 1785, when Solomon Rhoads built a fort there. It was the boyhood home of Senator John Rowan, Esq., identified as the builder and master of "My Old Kentucky Home." Calhoun was incorporated in 1852, made county seat in 1854, and called the "Capital of Green River Country."