In 1812, Kentucky had 2000 registered distilleries and there were many more unrecorded, let alone those in other states. The entire Ohio River Valley had 20,000 distilleries by 1830, and that includes Western Pennsylvania, Ohio, upstate New York, as well as Kentucky and Tennessee. In contrast, the eastern seaboard was relatively well connected by water and roads, so farmers could usually sell their grain there. There was really no reason to distill it. So what happens when you have a glut of a particular good, and especially when it isn’t taxed at all, the result is whiskey becomes very cheap. Anyone can afford to drink it. And according to historian WJ rba, this led to America becoming a nation of drunkard. People drank three times the quantity of distilled spirits than they do today. They drank in the morning, midday and evening, men, women, and children drank. There was not a social occasion or seemingly even a work break that did not involve a Dr or two Augh even goes so far as to suggest that this generation was disillusioned with the unfulfilled promises of freedom offered by the revolution and more or less drank themselves into oblivion.