Hard cider was also the only alcohol available to the first settlers (early 17th century). Grain was not yet cultivated in large numbers for beermaking, the eng

Hard cider was also the only alcohol available to the first settlers (early 17th century). Grain was not yet cultivated in large numbers for beermaking, the engine of the slave trade [rum] hadn't taken hold yet, whiskey was deemed not fit for consumption by decent peoples (and the Scots and Irish hadn't yet arrived to figure out how to distill it), and wine was too difficult to import. The first liquor readily available was Applejack, a freeze-distilled spirit made from hard cider. Surprisingly, the first distillery ever licensed in the United States is still around - Laird & Company, of Scobeyville, New Jersey. George Washington asked the founder for his recipe before the Revolutionary War. Sadly, they no longer produce in NJ, and they no longer freeze-distill their spirit; the only commercially produced one available is American Alcohollery's Applejohn, in Moravian Falls, NC. I see this article, like others on Wikipedia, perpetuating the "they drank booze because water would kill them" myth. How did the original pioneers [to say nothing of the Native Americans..] survive in the new world for close to two decades, then, without any booze? Surely one single person who had been there for a long time might have said, "Uh, guys, actually, we drink the water here, it's fine, we're not dead. You don't have to grow apples for 10 years just to have something safe to drink." But according to modern armchair historians, that would have just been too crazy, and the half-drunken stupor of American pioneers for over a century sounds much more justifiable as "well, clearly they thought the water was bad".