150+ Years of Brewing in Colorado!

Dave Thomas

• The beer followed the miners who followed the Colorado gold and silver. First brewery 1859.

• Over $100 billion worth of Colorado gold and silver mined between 1859 and 1959.

• $18 billion beer sales in Colorado in 2011 alone!

19th Century Colorado Breweries

Alamosa 2 Florence 1 New Castle 1Aspen 1 Fort Garland 1 Ouray 4Black Hawk 7 Fort Logan 1 Pueblo 5Boulder 3 Georgetown 4 Rosita 1Caribou 1 Golden 6 Saguache 1Central City 6 Granite 1 Salida 1Colorado City 3 Gunnison 4 San Bernardo 1Colorado Springs 2 Howardsville 1 Sedgewick 2Creede 1 Idaho Springs 3 Silver Cliff 1Del Norte 2 Lake City 3 Silver Plume 1Denver 23 Las Animas 1 Silverton 1Durango 2 Leadville 7 Telluride 2Empire 2 Malta 3 Trinidad 6Evans 1 Manitou 1 Westcliffe 1Fairplay 2 Montrose 1

LATE 19th CENTURY COLORADO: 122 BREWERIES IN 44 DIFFERENT CITIES!

EARLY 21st CENTURY COLORADO: 148 BREWERIES IN 67 DIFFERENT CITIES!

The Changing Face of Beer• Pre-Europeans: Native Americans used corn (maize),

beans, yucca, fruit, tree and cactus sap to brew things like chica, tiswin, pulque, octli, aguardiente, asua...

• “Choc” beer, named for Choctaw Indians in Oklahoma, contained barley, hops, tobacco, fishberries (Coculus Indicus), and a small amount of alcohol.

• Europeans brought beer and brewing techniques using malted barley.

• In Colorado, European miners expected European beer taste. This lasted for over 100 years.

• Lagers brewed with adjuncts (corn & rice) dominated American beer from 1870s till present day.

• Craft and home brewers began expanding American beer taste profiles beginning in early 1980s. Some traditional European flavors and many new American products.

Denver Daily Tribune, Oct. 2, 1878

Central City’s European miner population

Census year % British %Continental 1860 66% 29% 1870 79% 18% 1880 95% 0% 1890 66% 27% 1900 51% 38%

Prohibition lasted much longer than 17 years!• U.S. Temperance movement began in

the mid-19th century. • Maine was first state to prohibit

alcoholic beverages in 1846.• Mississippi was the last state to repeal

Prohibition in 1966.• “By Telegraph: Judge Lord, of the Superior

Court of New York, has set aside a verdict that lager beer is not intoxicating.” - Daily Register Call, Jan. 14, 1870.

• Prohibition, repeal, and two world wars, inter alia, pushed the US beer palate from ales, stouts and porters towards lighter lagers.

Home delivery by brewers!• “Mathias Mack – Breweryman – I claim to make the Best

Beer that is brewed in Gilpin County. Deliver Beer every morning to all Parts of the County.” - Gilpin Observer, Dec. 22, 1888.

• “Excelsior Brewery – Ale, Porter and Lager Beer. Families and Saloons Supplied at short notice and on reasonable terms.” - Daily Mining Journal Nov. 29, 1865.

• “Mountain City Brewery – XXX Ale for Family Use $5.00 per keg, XX Ale for Family Use $4.00 per keg.” - Daily Register Call, Sept. 7, 1871.

• “The New Brewery is now prepared to fill all orders for their superior beer at short notice. Orders by letter or telegraph promptly attended to. Golden Brewery, Schuler & Coors.” - Colorado Transcript, July 22, 1874.

Ice, Ice and More Ice!

• Cut pond ice, manufacture your own, store in sawdust and hay in caves, sell the surplus.

• “…Mack’s Eureka Gulch brewery… has 1,500 tons of ice in his two ice houses. He says that the ice season is much better and cleaner than for several years past.” - Weekly Register Call, Jan. 30, 1891.

• “Boulder City Brewery has installed a mechanical ice plant at a cost of $30,000 [$750k today!] for use in their own brewery and to compete with the larger breweries of this state in selling ice to the public.” - Boulder Daily Camera, May 3, 1894.

• $6,000 worth of pond ice and $150,000 ($3.6M today) worth of manufactured ice sold in Denver in 1893.

19th Century brewers had to make their own malt“Boulder’s beer is reported the most honest product of honestly made malt in Colorado. The brewery is a steady and reliable purchaser of Boulder county barley, which ranks as the best produced in the west.”

Boulder Daily Camera, Jan. 1, 1896.

Colorado Transcript, April 13, 1898.

3-4 days for steeping, 8-10 days germination, 2-3 days for kilning.

Sell surplus materials to homebrewers, competitors, bakers, distillers,…

Yeast RosinMalt PitchHops IsinglassIce Irish MossHay Grain Feed

“The Best Wagons in Colorado Are Bishop & Prindles! For sale by Denver Ale Brewing Co.”

Rocky Mountain News, April 30, 1871.

Republican Presidents Tax Beer to pay for Wars!

• Civil War tax levied beginning Sept. 1, 1862.$1/bbl in 1862 = $23/bbl today.This tax was levied as beer left the brewery in kegs so brewers were not allowed to bottle their own beer until 1890.

• 1898 Spanish-American War tax of $2/bbl = $56/bbl today.

• “War! War! Vienna Lager Beer, the very best in this market, at [Central City bottler] Joseph Beaman’s…” - Evening Call, Feb. 25, 1878.

Medicinal Beer• During Prohibition Coloradoans were allowed

to drink alcohol for scientific, sacramental and medicinal purposes.

• In March, 1916, the Colorado legislature passed a law that would allow each family to “import two quarts of whiskey, or six quarts of wine, or twenty-four quarts of beer… each month…”

• Druggists were allowed to sell beer as medicine only until November, 1921 when the Campbell-Wilson anti-beer bill was passed in Washington.

Poisoned or Drugged Beer & Whiskey• Western saloonkeepers, in order to increase profits,

would sometimes cut beer and whiskey and add chewing tobacco, turpentine, gun powder or strychnine to replace the “kick” lost by adding water.

• “A German named Chas. Wells was enticed into a saloon in Denver by a couple of roughs, treated to drugged beer, and then robbed. One of the thieves has been arrested.” - Colorado Weekly Chieftain, Oct. 29, 1874.

• “A London medical journal has revealed that 50,000 pounds of Coculus Indicus, a drug used to stupify fish, has been eagerly appropriated by beer makers, in sufficient quantity to drug 30 million gallons of beer as a substitute for hops and to render it more intoxicating.” - Rocky Mountain News, Aug. 7, 1867.

Bribing the Fourth Estate“Remembered Again. Mr. Jacob Mack of the Aspen Brewery, never neglects to remember his friends when Christmas comes around. Yesterday he sent a keg of his excellent beer in the Times office as a Christmas remembrance for the boys. All who have partaken of it unite in testifying to its superior quality. May future recurrences of Christmas find Mr. Mack enjoying the prosperity he deserves.” - Aspen Daily Times, Dec. 25, 1886.

“Parties who are judges, say that the new brewery turns out excellent beer. We are under obligations to the owners, for a large keg thereof, left with us this week. It was more than could be gotten away with and outside assistance was necessary.” - Colorado Banner (Boulder), March 30, 1876.

Rocky Mountain News Aug. 25, 1864

RMN May 20, 1861

Boulder County News Dec 21, 1869

RMN March 1, 1865

“Cough Medicine: The best cure for coughs, colds, weak lungs, rheumatism, mountain fever and all other ailments incident to life in high altitudes is that celebrated Vienna lager beer sold by Joe Beaman, Spring street.” – Evening Call, March 29, 1878.

Truth in advertising!

“Lincoln’s Proclamation, No.2.Whereas, It becomes my duty to look with a watchful eye over the destinies of the millions I represent, and when I see them wandering from the Path of Rectitude, to gather them to my Bosom and give them wise counsel,Therefore, I, A. LINCOLN, President of the United States, RECOMMEND AND ADVISE the good people of Colorado Territory, to go to and buy your GROCERIES, LIQUORS, AND PROVISIONS of JOHN WARNER & CO., Black Hawk, Colorado…”

Daily Mining Journal ad, throughout 1863 & 1864

“The question why printers do not succeed as well as brewers is thus answered:

Because printers work for the head, and brewers for the stomach – and where twenty men have stomachs, but one has brains.” –

Daily Register Call, Dec. 14, 1869.