He “was a German-American poet, novelist, and short story writer. His writing was influenced by the social, cultural, and economic ambience of his adopted home city of Los Angeles. Bukowski’s work addresses the ordinary lives of poor Americans, the act of writing, alcohol, relationships with women, and the drudgery of work. The FBI kept a file on him as a result of his column Notes of a Dirty Old Man in the LA underground newspaper Open City.
Bukowski published extensively in small literary magazines and with small presses beginning in the early 1940s and continuing on through the early 1990s. He wrote thousands of poems, hundreds of short stories and six novels, eventually publishing over sixty books during the course of his career. Some of these works include his Poems Written Before Jumping Out of an 8 Story Window, published by his friend and fellow poet Charles Potts, and better-known works such as Burning in Water, Drowning in Flame. These poems and stories were later republished by John Martin’s Black Sparrow Press (now HarperCollins/Ecco Press) as collected volumes of his work. As noted by one reviewer, “Bukowski continued to be, thanks to his antics and deliberate clownish performances, the king of the underground and the epitome of the littles in the ensuing decades, stressing his loyalty to those small press editors who had first championed his work and consolidating his presence in new ventures such as the New York Quarterly, Chiron Review, or Slipstream.”
In 1986, Time called Bukowski a “laureate of American lowlife”. Regarding his enduring popular appeal, Adam Kirsch of The New Yorker wrote, “the secret of Bukowski’s appeal … [is that] he combines the confessional poet’s promise of intimacy with the larger-than-life aplomb of a pulp-fiction hero.”
During his lifetime, Bukowski received little attention from academic critics in the United States, but was better received in Europe, particularly the UK, and especially Germany, where he was born. Since his death in March 1994, Bukowski has been the subject of a number of critical articles and books about both his life and writings.
He wrote about his drinking quite a bit in poems, short stories and in legend. Below is one of his more memorable quotes:
But that’s just the tip of the iceberg, so to speak. Drinking was a favorite topic of Bukowski and his writings on the subject were collected into a single volume entitled “Charles Bukowski On Drinking” in 2019. Here’s a few gems from that volume:
From “Charles Bukowski Answers 10 Easy Questions”
“Question: What would you say is the best brand of American beer on the market today?
Bukowski: Well, that’s a bit difficult. Miller’s is the easiest on my system but each new batch of Miller’s seems to taste a bit worse. Something is going on there that I don’t like. I seem to be gradually going over to Schlitz. And I prefer beer in the bottle. Beer in the can definitely gives off a metallic taste. Cans are for the convenience of storekeepers and breweries. Whenever I see a man drinking out of a can I think, “now there is a damn fool.” Also, bottled beer should be in a brown bottle. Miller again errs in putting the stuff into a white bottle. Beer should be protected both from metal and from light.
Of course, if you have the money, it’s best to go up the scale and get the more expensive beers, imported or better-made American. Instead of a dollar 35 you have to go a dollar 75 or 2 and quarter and up. The taste is immediately noticeable. And you can drink more with less hangover. Most ordinary American beer is almost poison, especially the stuff that comes out of the spigots at racetracks. This beer actually stinks, I mean, to the nose. If you must buy a beer at the racetrack it is best to let it sit for 5 minutes before drinking it. There is something about the oxygen getting in there that removes some of the stink. The stuff is simply green.
Beer was much better before World War 2. It had tang and was filled with sharp little bubbles. It’s wash now, strictly flat. You just do the best you can with it.
Beer is better to write with and talk with than whiskey. You can go longer and make more sense. Of course, much depends upon the talker and the writer. But beer is fattening, plenty, and it lessens the sex drive, I mean, both the day you are drinking it and the day after. Heavy drinking and heavy loving seldom go hand in hand after the age of 35. I’d say a good chilled wine is the best way out and it should be drank slowly after a meal, with just perhaps a small glass before eating.
Heavy drinking is a substitute for companionship and it’s a substitute for suicide. It’s a secondary way of life. I dislike drunks but I do suppose I take a little drink now and then myself. Amen.”
brewed and filled by … (1964)
“everything in my beercan hand is sad, the dirt is even sad under my fingernails, and this hand is like the hand of a machine and yet it is not— it curves itself completely (an effort containing magic) around the beercan in a movement the same as roots pounding a gladiola up into the sun of air, and the beer goes into me.”
beerbottle (1974)
“a very miraculous thing just happened: my beerbottle flipped over backwards and landed on its bottom on the floor, and I have set it upon the table to foam down, but the photos were not so lucky today and there is a small slit along the leather of my left shoe, but it’s all very simple: we cannot acquire too much: there are laws we know nothing of, all manner of nudges set us to burning or freezing; what sets the blackbird in the cat’s mouth is not for us to say, or why some men are jailed like pet squirrels while others nuzzle in enormous breasts through endless nights—this is the task and the terror, and we are not taught why. still, it’s lucky the bottle landed straightside up, and although I have one of wine and one of whiskey, this forsooths, somehow, a good night, and perhaps tomorrow my nose will be longer: new shoes, less rain, more poems.”
The Bukowski Tapes (1985)
“I think a man can keep on drinking for centuries, he’ll never die; especially wine and beer . . . I like drunkards, because drunkards, they come out of it, and they’re sick and they spring back, they spring back and forth . . . If you gotta be anything, be an alcoholic. If I hadn’t been a drunkard, I probably would have committed suicide long ago. You know, working the factories, the eight hour job. The slums. The streets. You work a god damn lousy job. You come home at night, you’re tired. What are you gonna do, go to a movie? Turn on your radio in a three dollar a week room? Or are you gonna rest up and wait for the job the next day, for $1.75 an hour? Hell, no! You’re gonna get a bottle of whiskey and drink it. And go down to a bar and maybe get in a fist fight. And meet some bitch, something’s going on. Then you go to work the next day, and do your simple little things, right? . . . Alcohol gives you the release of the dream without the deadness of drugs. You can come back down. You have your hangover to face. That’s the tough part. You get over it, you do your job. You come back. You drink again. I’m all for alcohol. It’s the thing.”
beer (1976)
“I don’t know how many bottles of beer I have drunk while waiting for things to get better. I don’t know how much wine and whiskey and beer mostly beer I have drunk after splits with women— waiting for the phone to ring waiting for the sound of footsteps, and the phone never rings until much later and the footsteps never arrive until much later when my stomach is coming up out of my mouth they arrive as fresh as spring flowers: ‘what the hell have you done to yourself? it will be 3 days before you can fuck me!’
the female is durable she lives seven and one half years longer than a man, and she drinks very little beer because she knows it’s bad for the figure.
while we are going mad they are out dancing and laughing with horny cowboys.
well, there’s beer sacks and sacks of empty beer bottles and when you pick them up the bottles fall through the wet bottom of the paper sacks rolling clanking spilling grey wet ash and stale beer, or the sacks fall over at 4 A.M. in the morning making the only sound in your life.
beer rivers and seas of beer beer beer beer the radio singing love songs as the phone remains silent and the walls stand straight up and down the beer is all there is.”
Today is the birthday of Johan Gustav Christoffer Thorsager Kjeldahl (August 16, 1849-July 18, 1900) He was a Danish chemist who developed a method for determining the amount of nitrogen in certain organic compounds using a laboratory technique which was named the Kjeldahl method after him.
Kjeldahl worked in Copenhagen at the Carlsberg Laboratory, associated with Carlsberg Brewery, where he was head of the Chemistry department from 1876 to 1900.
He was given the job to determine the amount of protein in the grain used in the malt industry. Less protein meant more beer. Kjeldahl found the answer was in developing a technique to determine nitrogen with accuracy but existing methods in analytical chemistry related to proteins and biochemistry at the time were far from accurate.
The method consists of heating a substance with sulphuric acid, which decomposes the organic substance by oxidation to liberate the reduced nitrogen as ammonium sulphate. In this step potassium sulphate is added to increase the boiling point of the medium (from 337 °C to 373 °C) . Chemical decomposition of the sample is complete when the initially very dark-coloured medium has become clear and colourless.
The solution is then distilled with a small quantity of sodium hydroxide, which converts the ammonium salt to ammonia. The amount of ammonia present, and thus the amount of nitrogen present in the sample, is determined by back titration. The end of the condenser is dipped into a solution of boric acid. The ammonia reacts with the acid and the remainder of the acid is then titrated with a sodium carbonate solution by way of a methyl orange pH indicator.
In practice, this analysis is largely automated; specific catalysts accelerate the decomposition. Originally, the catalyst of choice was mercuric oxide. However, while it was very effective, health concerns resulted in it being replaced by cupric sulfate. Cupric sulfate was not as efficient as mercuric oxide, and yielded lower protein results. It was soon supplemented with titanium dioxide, which is currently the approved catalyst in all of the methods of analysis for protein in the Official Methods and Recommended Practices of AOAC International.
And Velp Scientifica also has an explanation of his method, which is still in use today.
Last year I decided to concentrate on Bock ads. Bock, of course, may have originated in Germany, in the town of Einbeck. Because many 19th century American breweries were founded by German immigrants, they offered a bock at certain times of the year, be it Spring, Easter, Lent, Christmas, or what have you. In a sense they were some of the first seasonal beers. “The style was later adopted in Bavaria by Munich brewers in the 17th century. Due to their Bavarian accent, citizens of Munich pronounced ‘Einbeck’ as ‘ein Bock’ (a billy goat), and thus the beer became known as ‘Bock.’ A goat often appears on bottle labels.” And presumably because they were special releases, many breweries went all out promoting them with beautiful artwork on posters and other advertising.
Friday’s ad is not for a specific Bock Beer, but for an upcoming Bock Beer Festival at the Alpine Village Beer Garden, and was published on August 15, 1969. This one is for the Alpine Village in Torrance, California, which was originally founded in 1968. They had Bavarian Dances every weekend, but the Bock Beer Festival took place on august 17. Unfortunately, it closed during Covid, but has recently been designated as culturally significant and saved from demolition. This ad for the event ran in The Daily Breeze, of Hermosa Beach, California.
Today is the birthday of Charles D. Goepper (August 15, 1860-June 7, 1909). In 18990, he was elected Secretary of the Phoenix Brewery of Louisville, Kentucky. The brewery was founded in 1859 as the Philip Zang Brewery, but became known as the Phoenix Brewery just two years later, in 1861, but closed in 1916 due to prohibition.
Here is Goepper’s obituary from the American Brewers’ Review:
And this obituary is from the Louisville Courier Journal:
And this obituary is from the same day in Louisville Courier Journal, but is slightly different, possibly from different editions, like the morning and evening papers?:
Today is the birthday of Adam Eulberg (August 15, 1835-May 20, 1901). He was born in Nassau, Germany but moved to Portage, Wisconsin with his family when he was 19, in 1854. In 1884 he and his brother Peter bought the City Brewery, which had been founded in 1852 by Carl Haertel. His brother Peter passed away suddenly shortly thereafter and Adam carried on the business alone, at least until his two sons were old enough to join him. Adam and Peter renamed the brewery Eulberg Bros. Brewery, but Adam’s family changed it to the Eulberg Brewing Co. in 1907. They survived prohibition making soda, and resumed beer production after repeal, but the Eulbergs sold the business in 1944. It closed for good in 1958.
This is Eulberg’s obituary from the American Brewers’ Review:
The Eulberg Brewery before he bought it, in 1880.
This short history of the brewery is from the Wisconsin Historical Society:
Milwaukee dominated Wisconsin’s early brewing industry, but successful breweries were found in communities throughout the state. In 1852, German immigrant Carl Haertel began producing beer in Portage, Wisconsin. In 1884, brothers Adam and Peter Eulberg, also originally from Germany, acquired the Haertel Brewery. The Eulberg Brewing Company remained in the family until 1944 and shut its doors permanently in 1958.
And here’s another history of the brewery building itself, which is still standing in downtown Portage, Wisconsin.
As far as I can tell, he’s not related to Caspar Eulberg, who was born in roughly the same area of Germany, and started a brewery in Galena, Illinois called C. Eulberg & Sons.
Today is the birthday of Christian Benjamin Feigenspan (August 15, 1844-April 10, 1899). He was born in Thuringia, Germany but moved his family to New Jersey and founded the C. Feigenspan Brewing Company of Newark in 1875, though at least one source says 1868. When he died in 1899, his son Christian William Feigenspan took over management of the brewery, which remained in business through prohibition, but was bought by Ballantine in 1943.
There’s surprisingly little biographical information about Christian Benjamin Feigenspan, but here’s some history of his brewery:
In 1875 the Christian Feigenspan Brewing Company was founded at 49 Charlton St., at the former Laible brewery where he had previously been a superintendent. He would also marry Rachel Laible.
In 1878, he reportedly built a brewery on Belmont Street, and as late as 1886 a facility at 54 Belmont would be listed as the “Feigenspan Bottling Establishment”.
In 1880, Christian Feiganspan took over the Charles Kolb lager beer brewery (founded 1866) on Freeman Street. (Altho’, an 1873 map of Newark shows the property owned by a “Lenz Geyer Company”. There was a “Geyer” who was another Newark brewer who owned an “Enterprise Brewery” on Orange St.)
An 1884 fire would, reportedly, burn the brewery to the ground for a loss of $300,000.
By 1909, the firm would be advertising that “…Feigenspan Breweries are the largest producers of Ale in the United States!” (click on barrel above for text of ad) in an apparent dig at their much larger next door neighbor, P. Ballantine & Sons. Ballantine’s Lager Beer sales having by then accounted for 3/4 of their total production.
Possibly because of WWI era restrictions on the allowable alcohol level of beer (set at a mere 2.75%), Feigenspan entered into Prohibition with 4,000 barrels of aging ale in its cellar. In 1927, the ale would make the news as they tried to sell it. One story in July had it going to Heinz in Pittsburgh to be made into malt vinegar, but follow up articles say that in early November the ale was simply dumped into the sewer “…and thence into the Passaic River”.
Sadly, it would not be the first beer dumped by Feigenspan, which had one of the first four licenses to brew “medicinal beer” at the start of Prohibition. “Medicinal beer” was soon outlawed by the “Anti-Beer” law, and the brewery had to dump 600 cases of “real beer” (4.5% alcohol) in March of 1922.
Last year I decided to concentrate on Bock ads. Bock, of course, may have originated in Germany, in the town of Einbeck. Because many 19th century American breweries were founded by German immigrants, they offered a bock at certain times of the year, be it Spring, Easter, Lent, Christmas, or what have you. In a sense they were some of the first seasonal beers. “The style was later adopted in Bavaria by Munich brewers in the 17th century. Due to their Bavarian accent, citizens of Munich pronounced ‘Einbeck’ as ‘ein Bock’ (a billy goat), and thus the beer became known as ‘Bock.’ A goat often appears on bottle labels.” And presumably because they were special releases, many breweries went all out promoting them with beautiful artwork on posters and other advertising.
Thursday’s ad is for Stiegl Golden Bock Beer, which was published on August 14, 1982. This one is for the Stiegl Brauerei of Salzburg, Austria, which was originally founded in 1492. This ad for the imported beer ran in The Chicago Tribune, of Chicago, Illinois.
Today is the birthday of Eugene Louis Husting (August 14, 1848-November 27, 1916). He was born in Luxembourg, Germany, but came to the U.S. when he was only five, and settled with his family in Wisconsin. In 1877, he founded the Eugene L. Husting Brewery. In 1900, they changed its name to the E. L. Husting Co. Brewery, but it was closed due to prohibition in 1918. They appear to have concentrated on Weiss beer, and may have also been known as the E.L. Husting Weiss Beer Brewery. After repeal, the brewery never returned to brewing beer, instead concentrating on soda. The soda company closed in 1970.
The Eugene Husting Brewery in 1893.
This obituary of Husting is from the American Brewers’ Review:
This account of the brewery’s history is from the Blog, The Distant Mirror:
One other historic Milwaukee brewery that focused primarily on brewing wheat-based beer was Eugene Louis Husting. Like many brewers before and after him, Eugene began as a brewer at the Northwestern Brewery, which was owned by Phillip Altpeter. After marrying Phillip’s daughter Bertha in 1872, E.L. Husting opened his own weiss beer brewery and soda factory on the east side of 5th St. between Cherry St. and Vliet St. in 1877. By 1884 Husting was brewing weiss beer in an 8 barrel brew kettle and selling the product in stoneware bottles. In 1897 the Husting Brewery expanded inventory to include ginger ale, soda water, cream and orange soda, raspberry wine, and cider. As a result of prohibition (1920-1933), brewing beer discontinued and instead soda was exclusively produced. Following prohibition the company evolved into a beer and soda distributor until 1970 when the plant shut down. Today, the main building is still intact and is now considered the oldest standing complete brewery in Milwaukee.
Soon it was on to the oldest complete standing brewery structure in Milwaukee, the EL. Husting Brewery, whose name is still embossed along an upper cornice of the cream city brick building, which inci- dentally is now home to Great Lakes Archaeological Research Center, a former employer of mine. This brewery and soda factory was established by Eugene Louis Husting in 1877 on the eastside of 5th Street between Cheery Street and Vliet Street In 1884 EL Husting was brewing weiss beer in an eight-barrel brew kettle and bottling in stoneware bottles. He continued to brew sodas and beer here until he died in 1916, after which sodas became the primary bever- age of production during prohibition. Following Prohibition in 1933 the facility became a distribution plant for beer and liquor until it shut down in 1970.
Today is the 49th (maybe) birthday of Brandon Hernández, who is a Brewing Industry Contributor at The San Diego Union-Tribune and also stays busy with the San Diego Beer News, as a Craft Beer Correspondent at FOX 5 San Diego, Co-Host at The Indie Beer Show, Beer To The Rescue, and Food & Beverage Editor / San Diego On-Tap Host at Ranch & Coast Magazine. He also used to bethe Chief Marketing Officer for Societe Brewing, and before that AleSmith and Stone Brewing. And he’s published the Complete Guide to San Diego Breweries in 2015. Until recently, I used to run into Brandon fairly regularly at beer functions and he’s become one of my favorite people to hang out with. Join me in wishing Brandon a very happy birthday.
Brandon and me at the Firestone Walker Invitational Beer Festival earlier this year.
Brandon and me at Bell’s a few years back.
Nice towering press photo of Brandon.
With fellow writers at the opening event for the CBC in Washington, DC in 2013. From left, Stephen Beaumont, me, Steve Shapiro, Gail Williams, Brandon and Chuck Cook.
At Churchill’s in San Diego with Tomme Arthur in 2012.
With a bevy of Celebrator writers in Chico for Beer Camp #93 in late 2012, to make a beer celebrating the 25th anniversary of the Celebrator Beer News. That’s Brandon sporting blond hair fourth from the left.
[Note: photos 3 and 5 were purloined from Facebook.]
Last year I decided to concentrate on Bock ads. Bock, of course, may have originated in Germany, in the town of Einbeck. Because many 19th century American breweries were founded by German immigrants, they offered a bock at certain times of the year, be it Spring, Easter, Lent, Christmas, or what have you. In a sense they were some of the first seasonal beers. “The style was later adopted in Bavaria by Munich brewers in the 17th century. Due to their Bavarian accent, citizens of Munich pronounced ‘Einbeck’ as ‘ein Bock’ (a billy goat), and thus the beer became known as ‘Bock.’ A goat often appears on bottle labels.” And presumably because they were special releases, many breweries went all out promoting them with beautiful artwork on posters and other advertising.
Wednesday’s ad is for New South Bock Beer, which was published on August 13, 1914. This one is for the New South Brewery & Ice Co. of Middlesboro, Kentucky, which was originally founded in 1891. They also had a second brewery located in Atlanta, Georgia, which is undoubtedly why this ad ran in The Atlanta Journal, also of Atlanta, Georgia.
