Whiskey making, credited in origin to the monks of Ireland and carried to Colonial America by the Scotch-Irish, became an important frontier industry in the Appalachian region during the late 18th and early 19th centuries, when settlers used it as one of the few available sources of cash income to buy necessities such as salt, sugar, rifles, and gunpowder. After the federal government imposed an excise tax on whiskey in 1791 to help pay debts from the War for Independence, the Whiskey Rebellion spread across the western frontier and became especially violent in western Pennsylvania, and although the government suppressed it, illegal distilling or moonshine continued as an underground industry well into the 20th century, especially in isolated Appalachian areas. The Perryopolis distillery is believed to have been built about 1790 by Israel Shreve, who leased the grist mill and land from George Washington, and it served farmers who brought grain to the mill for processing, with corn and rye as the main grains used. Surplus grain was ground at the mill and moved to the distillery, where distilling took place in the basement; a well supplied water to the still, a seven-foot-square chimney drew smoke through pipes during heating, and a small hole carried mash to an outdoor trough where animals could feed. The second floor stored grain before distillation and later barrels of good Monongahela Rye Whiskey, and although the original apparatus is gone, it probably resembled the equipment in George Washington's about 1797 distillery at Mount Vernon.
