Rum is the beverage of choice in the islands – mellow, smooth, and easy-going like the Caribbean itself.

St. Croix was discovered in 1493 by Christopher Columbus and he named it "Santa Cruz" (Holy Cross). The natives were called "Cruzans." Years later, under the French flag, Santa Cruz was named St. Croix - and so it is today.

This is the birthplace of rum, since the early 1650s, linked in our colonial past with the raising of sugar cane. On St. Croix, cane fields covered almost two-thirds of the island "when sugar was king." Most plantations also had still-houses for the making of rum. The rums became so well known for their quality that they were soon traded as a valuable commodity in all parts of the world. Ruins of plantations and sugar mills still dot our island.

A young Alexander Hamilton spent his early years on St. Croix and served as a clerk in trading rum, sugar, and molasses for American products before eventually moving to the mainland, attending University and becoming aide de camp to George Washington during the Revolutionary War.