Brookston Beer Bulletin

Jay R. Brooks on Beer

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Beer In Ads #2048: Opinions Differ …

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Thursday’s ad is for Miller High Life, from 1948. In this ad, from the back of a baseball game program, two players are arguing while an umpire. It’s to say exactly what’s going on since the catcher appears to holding the bat. How, or why, he took it from the batter is anybody’s guess. The ball is on the ground and another player is laying down behind, possibly on a base, and watching the scene unfold. As for the ump, he just seems to be standing there serenely, with his hands folded in front of him, waiting for the storm to subside. I think they could all use a beer.

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Patent No. 2906624A: Apparatus And Method For Extracting Air From Beverages

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Today in 1959, US Patent 2906624 A was issued, an invention of Pincus Deren, assigned to Pabst Brewing Co., for his “Apparatus and Method for Extracting Air from Beverages.” There’s no Abstract, although in the description it includes these claims:

The present invention consists in the method or process of controlling the air content of carbonated beverages, especially bottled beer, and to the apparatus for carrying out the process.

It is well known that conventional practices in bottling carbonated beverages, particularly beer, causes a certain amount of oxidation of some of the constituents of the product, resulting in an undesirable change in flavor and in accelerated instability which greatly reduces the shelf life of the beverage.

Numerous attempts were made to eliminate’the excess air, and it was found that to remove the excess air successfully it was necessary to cause the beverage to foam and permit the latter to rise in the neck of the bottle to expel the air above the liquid level. Also, it was found that, to achieve good results, enough of the foam must be formed to fill the neck with fine bubbles to the top of the rim of the bottleneck.

One means for producing foam is by knocking the bottle sufliciently to cause the release of the gas in the beer; another means is by jetting or squirting a stream of beer into the beer in the bottle after it has been filled. A third method is by the injection of a stream of CO gas into the liquid.

Control of the degree of foaming by the methods just described is very difficult. When the knocking procedure is used, the condition of the surface of the bottle influences the degree of foaming. When jetting, either with beer or with CO gas, the liquid content is disturbed, and small variations in the temperature of the product and on the inside surface of the container will result in different degrees of foaming. The uncontrolled foaming results in either great variations in the final air content, or in the loss of large quantities of beer.

The primary object of the present invention is to overcome the disadvantages inherent in the conventional 7 Another object of the invention resides in the provision of novel means for removing most of the air before the foam is formed.

A further object is to reduce the losses of beverage due to excessive foaming and thereby practically eliminate socalled short fills.

A still further object resides in the provision of novel means for creating instantaneous suction on the liquid just as the foam starts to form to facilitate the removal of air.

Still another object of the invention consists in the provision of a new and novel apparatus to permit the process and the steps thereof to be accomplished and carried out successfully.

Numerous other objects and advantages will be apparent throughout the progress of the specification.

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Beer, Diapers and Correlation

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This is only marginally about beer, but since I’m often reading over data, statistics and scientific reports, notions of causation and correlation have become a subject of great interest. This is a Slideshare by Mark Madson, a research analyst with Third Nature in Portland, Oregon. Apparently in schools teaching business, marketing and the like, instructors often include a tale showing a correlation between the sales of beer and diapers, to illustrate thinking in new ways and how seemingly unrelated items might be connected, or could be connected by a savvy company. Having worked retail for many years during various stages of my life, the science of getting a customer’s attention through shelf placement, cross-merchandising and other strategies I find fascinating, in part because it’s a window into human nature itself. In his presentation, Beer, Diapers, and Correlation: A Tale of Ambiguity, Madson examines the oft-related story of a correlation between beer and diapers and tries to find out its origin and whether or not it’s actually true.

The story of the correlation between beer and diaper sales is commonly used to explain product affinities in introductory data mining courses. Rarely does anyone ask about the origin of this story. Is it true? Why is it true? What does true mean anyway?

The latter question is the most interesting because it challenges the ideas of accuracy in data and analytic models.

This is the real history of the beer and diapers story, explaining its origins and truth, based on repeated analyses of retail data over two decades. It will show that one can have multiple contradictory results from analytic models, and how they can all be true.

Patent No. 460291A: Apparatus For Heating And Pitching Barrels

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Today in 1891, US Patent 460291 A was issued, an invention of Friedeich Jung, for his “Apparatus for Heating and Pitching Barrels.” There’s no Abstract, although in the description it includes these claims:

The object of my invention, as described below, is to burn out beer-barrels with a direct flame and to remove the danger of explosions, which are still of frequent occurrence in pitching barrels. It is a notorious fact that the latter far more frequently occurs especially when barrels are pitched by the application of hot air or steam than when an open flame or direct fire is employed. The explosive gases are generated and the explosion is produced generally on account of a want of atmospheric air in the barrel.

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Patent No. 5248062A: Beer Keg Tap Apparatus

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Today in 1993, US Patent 5248062 A was issued, an invention of Vincent G. Hillard, for his “Beer Keg Tap Apparatus.” Here’s the Abstract:

A tap member is arranged with a threaded lid directed into engagement with an upper end of the tap structure configured as a cylindrical housing, including a cavity receiving a compressed gas canister there within. Upon projection of the lid into the housing, the canister is pierced directing compressed gas from the canister into an underlying beer keg, whereupon beer is dispensed through a dispensing conduit.

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Patent No. 4406301A: Keg-Tapping Structure

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Today in 1983, US Patent 4406301 A was issued, an invention of Vincent J. Cerrato, for his “Keg-Tapping Structure.” Here’s the Abstract:

The invention contemplates removable structure to facilitate keg-tapping, and pressurized dispensing of liquid contents of the keg. A so-called Barnes neck forms part of the keg and has a bore with an elastomeric ring seal and flange at its lower end, and a valve-and-tube subassembly is inserted through the neck, to the point of valve-body compression of the seal, when secured by a removable retaining ring. In the course of such insertion, one or more radially inward lugs on the neck flange track corresponding slot formations in the subassembly. Each such slot formation has a first upward longitudinal course, leading to an angular bayonet-like offset course, and then to a second upward longitudinal course. The location of the angular offset is such that the valve body cannot compressionally load the seal ring in the absence of the partial rotation needed to develop lug alignment with the second upward longitudinal course.

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Beer In Ads #2045: The Brown Bottle Joke

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Monday’s ad is for Miller High Life, from 1913, published in the Telegraph Herald on July 2, 1913. In this curious ad, titled “The Result of Good Brewing—,” the scene is a parade of Germany soldiers. Though it’s hard to read, toward the bottom it reads “High Life in Germany,” while to the left the Miller Girl has been inserted into the illustration as if she’s watching the parade.

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But even more curious about this ad is the inset box, “The Brown Bottle Joke,” where they try to explain why using a clear bottle is actually better than using brown, and they do so without even mentioning why brown is preferred or indeed anything about what effect light would have on the beer after bottling.

The brown bottle fallacy has been so completely exploded that little is left to be said in defense of that side of the question which advocated the use of dark bottles to the absolute exclusion of light bottles. It is admitted that common beer comes in dark bottles and that beer of a high degree of stability is preferably bottled in light bottles.

Wahl-Henius Institute of Fermentology (America’s greatest authorities on brewing) are in accord with this view. Here is their statement in relation to the bottling of high-grade beer:

“FOR SUCH BEERS THE LIGHT BOTTLE is PREFERABLY EMPLOYED because it can more readily be inspected before filling to insure thorough cleanliness and because the finished package reveals at a glance whether the contents meet the requirements of the consumer as to color, clarity and freedom from sedimentation.”

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