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MOUNT VERNON, Va. (Reuters) – George Washington made whiskey here.

As America’s first president and one of its canniest early entrepreneurs, Washington liked a sip of cinnamon whiskey — and he distilled his own. More than that, he started a thriving business selling a raw, clear liquor made from rye and corn.

“Two hundred gallons of Whiskey will be ready this day for your call, and the sooner it is taken the better, as the demand for this article (in these parts) is brisk,” Washington wrote in a letter to his nephew in October 1799.

At its peak, the distillery produced 11,000 gallons (50,010 liters) of liquor, which fetched the then-astronomical sum of $7,500. After Washington’s death late in 1799, the distillery passed to his nephew Lawrence Lewis, who appeared to have less success with it. By 1815, the building was gone.

Folks around Washington’s estate at Mount Vernon always knew there was a distillery on the property when he was alive, and archaeologists uncovered its location in 1932. Now scholars are digging at the site of the liquor-making operation, hoping to learn enough to rebuild it and start making whiskey again.