Existing comment:
Copper still
This late nineteenth century copper liquor still, with approximately 100 gallon capacity, was used by the McConnell family of Washington County, Virginia, for its liquor business since about 1890.
Moonshining:
This large copper still was used in the backwoods near Abington for many years after it was made about 1890. Moonshining is distilling liquor without paying excise taxes, which have been imposed intermittently since the 1790s, and continuously since 1865. Those charged with collecting the taxes and destroying illicit stills were often called revenuers.
Prohibition, which made all liquor production illegal, began in Virginia in 1916 and nationwide in 1919. It made moonshining even more profitable. By 1923, Virginia was the third largest moonshining state. The Franklin County Conspiracy, in which dozens of revenuers and government officials were shown to have been bribed by moonshiners, made national headlines for months in 1935 and earned Franklin County, such of Roanoke, the nickname "the wettest place in the United States." |