The Rising Sun was originally a residence, built in 1760 by Charles Washington, George's youngest brother, but beginning in the early 1790s it served as a tavern for some 30 years. You'll be thoroughly entertained during the 30-minute tours, perhaps led by a tavern wench -- an indentured servant sentenced to 7 years for stealing a loaf of bread in England. The Rising Sun Tavern was a proper high-class tavern, she explains, not for riffraff. The gentlemen congregated over Madeira and cards in the Great Room or had a rollicking good time in the Taproom over multicourse meals and many tankards of ale. Meanwhile, ladies were consigned to the Retiring Room, where they would gossip and do needlework. You must take a tour, but you can join the one in progress when you get here and see what you missed on the next.