Ambitious Brew: The Story of American Beer (26 page)

The temperance movement regained strength in the years just after the Civil War. This magazine image from 1874 shows members of the “Women’s Crusade” on the march, stopping at saloons to pray that the owners would abandon their evil trade. More often than not, they were met by ridicule or worse; in some cases, tavern patrons pelted the women with fruit or threw buckets of water on them.
Photo courtesy of the Library of Congress, Prints & Photographs Division (LC-USZ62-90543)

Beer was never as popular as liquor during Prohibition because it cost more to make and ship. That didn’t stop racketeers from making “alley brew” or federal agents from seizing bootleg beer when they could find it. But the man managing a two-fisted dump of illegal brew (right) was a civilian, part of a vigilante group in Zion, Illinois, that waylaid a truck carrying beer out of Chicago and staged a public demolition of the entire load.
Photos courtesy of the Library of Congress, Prints & Photographs Division
(LC-USZ62-96024 and LC-USZ62-95873)

A Prohibition raid in Detroit. There’s no way to know if the seized bootleg beer came from the breweries named on the wooden cases, or if racketeers had loaded their illicit brew into whatever packing boxes they could find. But many legitimate brewers who once vowed to obey the law found it hard to resist the temptation of illegal brewing.
Photo courtesy of the Walter P. Reuther Library, Wayne State University

On May 14, 1932, these residents of Detroit heeded the call of New York City’s mayor, Jimmie Walker, and joined tens of thousands of Americans in “beer parades,” demanding “Beer for Taxation.”
Photo courtesy of the Walter P. Reuther Library, Wayne State University

Fritz Maytag and his San Francisco brewery, c. 1970. The equipment Maytag inherited had more in common with Phillip Best’s 1844 brewhouse than with ultramodern beer factories. But perseverance paid off: By the mid-1970s, he and his employees had put Anchor Brewing on the nation’s zyomtechnic map. The tie-wearing Maytag looks out of place among his long-haired employees, but they respected him. Some of the people in this photograph were still working at Anchor thirty years later.
Photos courtesy of Fritz Maytag and Anchor Brewing Company

Jack McAuliffe, founder of the nation’s first microbrewery, in 1978. McAuliffe designed and built much of New Albion’s equipment, but he also relied on material that he salvaged from scrap yards, including this antique barrel washer.
Photo courtesy of Michael E. Miller and Jack McAuliffe

Ken Grossman in 1981, with one of his brewery’s original vats, which he and partner Paul Camusi fabricated from pieces and parts gathered from dairies and salvage yards.
Photo courtesy of Ken Grossman and Sierra Nevada Brewing Co.

Even the labels of craft brewers heralded a new era. These examples from New Albion, Mendocino, and Sierra Nevada reflect the personalities and passions of the men who made the beer.
New Albion label courtesy of Dave Gauspohl. Mendocino Brewing label courtesy of Michael Laybourn. Sierra Nevada label courtesy of Daniel Bradford.