Henry Foxall came to Washington in 1800 with an armload of defense contracts and established a munitions plant on the banks of the Potomac. He was here at the personal request of Thomas Jefferson, who felt that the federal city needed its own cannon foundry.
Riggs Bank was a Washington institution for over a hundred years. More than 20 U.S. Presidents (ranging from Lincoln to Nixon) banked at Riggs, and their headquarters across the street from the Treasury Department used to be pictured on the back of the old ten dollar bill.
Washington was home to hundreds of small and large breweries during the Industrial Revolution. The Christian Heurich Brewery was the most noteworthy, producing 500,000 barrels of award winning beer a year.
