Why Reconstruct George Washington's Distillery?

George Washington was the only founding father to commercially operate a distillery.  Its large size and volume of production made the building one of the most important structures of its kind in 18th-century America.    George Washington's Distillery is the first 18th-century distillery in North America to be systematically excavated by archaeologists.   The level of historical documentation about George Washington's Distillery is unusually detailed for the 18th-century. For example, George Washington's distillery ledger documents the families who frequented the distillery and the quantities of and prices paid for the whiskey. Weekly farm reports from 1797 to 1799 also provide a detailed record of the Distillery's construction and operation.   The archaeological evidence of the Distillery is very well preserved, providing favorable conditions for investigation.   At peak production, the Distillery utilized five stills and a boiler and produced 11,000 gallons of whiskey, yielding George Washington a better-than-average sale of $7,500 in 1799. This made the Distillery one of the most successful and important economic components of Mount Vernon.   George Washington’s Gristmill, located adjacent to the distillery site, reopened to the public in April 2002.  The Gristmill enables Mount Vernon educators to show how Washington’s complex farming operation expanded to include the means to process his own grain and export it around the world.  With the addition of the Distillery, Mount Vernon shows visitors another enterprise of Washington’s, which further reveals his entrepreneurial approach to farming.    No operating distillery from the 18th-century exists in America, making Mount Vernon’s Distillery the only site which demonstrates the authentic 18th-century distillation process.

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