Brookston Beer Bulletin

Jay R. Brooks on Beer

  • Home
  • About
  • Editorial
  • Birthdays
  • Art & Beer

Socialize

  • Dribbble
  • Email
  • Facebook
  • Flickr
  • GitHub
  • Instagram
  • LinkedIn
  • Pinterest
  • RSS
  • Twitter
  • YouTube
Powered by Head Quarters Built on WordPress

Archives for March 5, 2023

Beer In Ads #4371: Miss Rheingold 1956 Out In Front

March 5, 2023 By Jay Brooks

Sunday’s ad is for “Rheingold Beer,” from 1956. This ad was made for the Rheingold Brewery, which was founded by the Liebmann family in 1883 in New York, New York. At its peak, it sold 35% of all the beer in New York state. In 1963, the family sold the brewery and in was shut down in 1976. In 1940, Philip Liebmann, great-grandson of the founder, Samuel Liebmann, started the “Miss Rheingold” pageant as the centerpiece of its marketing campaign. Beer drinkers voted each year on the young lady who would be featured as Miss Rheingold in advertisements. In the 1940s and 1950s in New York, “the selection of Miss Rheingold was as highly anticipated as the race for the White House.” The winning model was then featured in at least twelve monthly advertisements for the brewery, beginning in 1940 and ending in 1965. Beginning in 1941, the selection of next year’s Miss Rheingold was instituted and became wildly popular in the New York Area. Hillie Merritt was elected as Miss Rheingold 1955. Not to take anything away from the other Miss Rheingolds, but her story is pretty amazing. She was born Hildegarde Ercklentz in Hamburg, Germany in 1934 but she moved to New York when her father was given a position there with the German bank he worked for. In 1941, they had to flee the United States and lived for a time in Japan, before finally making it back to Hamburg after the war and then by 1950 was living once again in New York City. The story of that journey was written by her and published as “Journey Interrupted” in 2016. By 1955, she was Mrs. Hillie Merritt (although it may actually have been Merrill), with a one-year old son, and decided on a lark to enter the contest. Soon after the year she divorced and then married corporate executive David Mahoney, and they became a prominent couple in the NY social scene and in philanthropic circles. In 1990, they founded the Harvard Mahoney Neuroscience Institute, which Hildegarde Mahoney took charge of after her husband’s death in 2000 and she’s still running the charity today. In this ad, from August, Miss Rheingold 1956, Hillie Merritt, is on a sailboat, apparently involved in a race as she claims she’s “out in front and that’s where we intend to stay — thanks to a good breeze and smart crew.”

Below is the full-page version of the same ad:

Filed Under: Art & Beer, Beers Tagged With: Advertising, History, Rheingold

Historic Beer Birthday: Frederick “Fritz” Breckle

March 5, 2023 By Jay Brooks

san-francisco
Today is the birthday of Frederick “Fritz” Breckle (March 5, 1849-?). I can find almost nothing about Breckle, apart from he opened the Frederick Breckle Brewery in 1896, but it closed just one year later, in 1897. It was located at Point Lobos Road and Boice (or Boyce) Street. Given how close his last name is to Gottlieb Brekle, who started in 1871 what would become the Anchor Brewery in 1896, it would seem odd that they’re not related. In searching through old records, it appears that the two spelling are interchangeable, which frankly makes that more plausible. Also, a page from the 1880 census lists his father as “G. Breckle,” but with no more information that that. Still, it seems reasonable that both father and son could have been brewers. Although I have to say that’s pure speculation and guesswork, there’s nothing I can find that’s definitive or proves any connection.

San-Francisco-1897
San Francisco in 1897.
Anchor made a beer not too long ago in Brekle’s honor.

Filed Under: Birthdays, Just For Fun Tagged With: California, History, San Francisco

Find Something

Northern California Breweries

Please consider purchasing my latest book, California Breweries North, available from Amazon, or ask for it at your local bookstore.

Beer Bulletin Email

Enter your email address to receive daily digests:

Recent Comments

  • Lucy Corne on Beer Birthday: Lucy Corne-Duthie
  • Kendall Staggs on Beer In Ads #4341: Miss Rheingold 1955 Filling Yuletide Requests
  • Historic Beer Birthday: Robert Burns » Brookston Beer Bulletin on John Barleycorn
  • Susan Appel on Historic Beer Birthday: John Roehm
  • S. Pavelka on Beer Birthday: Rich Norgrove

Recent Posts

  • Historic Beer Birthday: Maximilian Schaefer March 23, 2023
  • Beer In Ads #4388: Miss Rheingold 1957 Finalists In A Circle March 22, 2023
  • Historic Beer Birthday: Joseph A. Straub March 22, 2023
  • Beer Birthday: Steve Wellington March 22, 2023
  • Beer In Ads #4387: Miss Rheingold 1957 Finalists Framed March 21, 2023

Tag Cloud

Advertising Anheuser-Busch Announcements Bay Area Belgium Brewers Association Brewing Equipment Budweiser Business California Christmas Europe France Germany Guinness Health & Beer History Holidays Hops Humor Infographics Kegs Law Mainstream Coverage Miller Brewing Northern California Pabst Packaging Patent Pennsylvania Press Release Prohibitionists Rheingold San Francisco Schlitz Science Science of Brewing Sports Statistics The Netherlands UK Uncategorized United States Video Washington

The Sessions

session_logo_all_text_1500

Next Session: Dec. 7, 2018
#142: One More for the Road
Previous Sessions
  • #141: Future of Beer Blogging
  • #140: Pivo
  • #139: Beer & the Good Life
  • #138: The Good in Wood
  • #137: German Wheat
Archive, History & Hosting

Typology Tuesday

Typology-png
Next Typology:
On or Before March 29, 2016
#3: Irish-Style Dry Stout
Previous Typologies
  • #2: Bock Feb. 2016
  • #1: Barley Wine Jan. 2016
Archive & History

This month’s posts

March 2023
S M T W T F S
 1234
567891011
12131415161718
19202122232425
262728293031  
« Feb    

BBB Archives