Brookston Beer Bulletin

Jay R. Brooks on Beer

Socialize

Patent No. 20110000913A1: Beer Can With Top & Bottom Pull Tabs

By

patent-logo
Today in 2011, just four years ago, US Patent 20110000913 A1 was issued, an invention of Todd Allen Bland, for a “Beer Can with Top and Bottom Pull Tabs.” Here’s the Abstract:

The herein invention discloses improvements to the conventional beer, soda or vegetable juice can such as tomato as well as medical or automotive such as oil cans containing fluid. The improvements consisting of one or a plurality of pull tabs on the top and the bottom of the can allowing the liquid to empty out of the cans in a matter of seconds. Prior art only shows one pull tab on the top taking the cans too long to empty for consumers that desire their beverage to flow quicker and to avoid spraying their beverage potentially getting in to the eyes of consumers and destroying property such as clothes and furniture as it is widely known consumers puncture holes toward the bottom of the can to release the liquid quicker endangering themselves and others by spraying beverage and by the sharp objects used to make the holes in the cans. My new invention will improve safety for these types of consumers furthermore if the top tab breaks the bottom pull tab will allow the can to be opened. Additionally, a tomatoe juice can having two pull tabs on the top allows the thick juice to flow more rapidly. This also relieves having a sharp can opener to accomplish this task.

US20110000913A1-20110106-D00000

US20110000913A1-20110106-D00001

Beer In Ads #1426: On Picnics It’s Truly Great

By


Monday’s ad is for Beverwyck Brewing, from 1949. The Beverwyck Brewery was located in Albany, and was founded in 1872. After prohibition ended, “Beverwyck reopened in 1933 with six products. Beverwyck India Ale and Porter were produced from 1933 through 1944, while Beverwyck Ale, Bock, Beer and Irish Cream Ale were produced from 1933 to 1950 when the brewery was acquired by the F. & M. Schaefer Brewing Co of Brooklyn, New York. F. & M. Schaefer closed the brewery in 1972.” Everybody looks really happy to be on a picnic, even the bird is smiling. I think it must be because those beer bottles are huge.

beverwyck_beer_1949

Patent No. 20120000367A1: Brewery Facility For Producing And Bottling Beer

By

patent-logo
Today in 2012, just three years ago, US Patent 20120000367 A1 was issued, an invention of Rudolf Michel and Ludwig Scheller, for a “Brewery Facility for Producing and Bottling Beer.” Here’s the Abstract:

The invention relates to a brewery plant (12) for producing and bottling beer, comprising a brewhouse facility (01) in which wort is produced from raw materials while employing process energy, and further comprising a bottling facility (02) in which beer produced from the wort is filled into packaging containers, in particular bottles, while employing process energy, wherein in order to supply the brewhouse facility (01) with process energy a first energy supply network (16) is provided, into which process heat having a first temperature level is fed from at least one first energy generation facility (17) and is distributed by a heat transfer means to different energy consumers (14, 15) in the brewhouse facility (01), and wherein in order to supply the bottling facility (02) with process energy a second energy supply network (21) is provided, into which process heat having a second temperature level is fed from at least one second energy generation facility (22) and is distributed by a heat transfer means to different energy consumers (23, 24, 25) in the bottling facility (02), wherein the maximum temperature of the heat transfer means in the first energy supply network is above the maximum temperature of the heat transfer means in the second energy supply network.

US20120000367A1-20120105-D00000

If you love this sort of thing, there’s much more about the specifics at the patent application page.

Beer In Ads #1425: For You Armchair Quarterbacks

By


Sunday’s ad is for Pabst Blue Ribbon, from 1947. Featuring singer and comedian Eddie Cantor dressed up in a football uniform, watching the game on to modern eyes is a very tiny television screen. There’s also a small table holding a bottle and a glass of beer. The tagline, “For You Armchair Quarterbacks,” forever linked drinking beer while watching football on TV.

Pabst-1947-QB

Patent No. 1166599A: Mash And Strainer Tank Machine

By

patent-logo
Today in 1916, US Patent 1166599 A was issued, an invention of Andreas R Keller, for a “Mash and Strainer Tank Machine.” There’s no Abstract, but in the description, the overview states the “invention relates to new and useful improvements in mash and .strainer tank machines, and is designed to increase the efficiency of such machines by improving the mixing, percolation, heating or cooking, straining, and drawing-off features, thereby overcoming the predominant and objectionable disadvantages of the machines now in use.”
US1166599-0
US1166599-1
US1166599-2

Patent No. 5275015A: Container-Cooler

By

patent-logo
Today in 1994, US Patent 5275015 A was issued, assigned to Miller Brewing, for a “container-cooler for a beverage, such as beer, includes a conventional keg-shaped outer shell, an inner vessel for containing the beverage retained within the shell, and a space between the inner vessel and the outer shell for receiving a cooling medium, such as ice.”

beer-keg-patent-drawing-vintage-aged-pixel

Beer In Ads #1424: Satisfaction Is What You Really Want In Beer!

By


Saturday’s ad is for Schlitz, from 1954. One of several ads from Schlitz that same year all with a yellow background and red line drawing. In this one, the foreground features a high-class bartender in a white jacket handing you a glass of Schlitz. He’s also offering up this pearl of wisdom. “Satisfaction is what you really want in beer!” I’m not quite sure exactly what that means, but it sounds like good copy.

Schlitz-1954-bartender

Beer Giants Still Giant

By

wall-street-journal
The Wall Street Journal had a piece on the beer business entitled Beer Giants Cultivate Their Crafty Side which I can’t read in its entirety because I don’t have a subscription, but it did include a chart showing the current state of affairs in the beer industry.

shifting-suds

Shifting Suds. “Independent brewers are selling more beer,” but given this comes from the Wall Street Journal (which is all about BIG business) they can’t help but add “but their shipments remain small compared with the big beer brands.”

What the Wall Street Journal forgets to mention is that Anheuser-Busch was founded in 1852 and didn’t hit 1 million annual barrels until 1901, when they were 49 years old. Sierra Nevada took only 35 years (or less) to reach 1 million, and Boston Beer needed even less time, reaching their first million barrels 1996, meaning it took Samuel Adams 12 years.

Don’t Bet Dollars To Donuts Or Drinking

By

doughnut
I think we can all agree that doughnuts are high in calories. I suspect few people would try to defend them as being a health food. Alcohol, on the other hand, is trickier. There are clear health benefits and, for some, health risks, too. But in order to paint alcohol as something worse than it is, prohibitionist groups feel no need to be truthful or avoid being misleading. To wit, today Alcohol Justice tweeted that “[t]here are the same amount of calories in a glass of wine as there are in a doughnut.”

AJ-tweet-15-01-03

To ad insult to injury, the image they used to hammer home their point depicts not one doughnut, as the text is singular, but a pile of them, in fact eleven doughnuts are visible, though some just partially. And look at that glass of wine. Does that look like the standard 5 ounces? It sure doesn’t to me. That looks like a short pour, all in effort to deceive and mislead, as if just a tiny amount of wine is equal to nearly a dozen doughnuts.

donut-wine

The truth, of course, is different. A standard glass of red wine — 5 ounces — is around 125 calories, while a doughnut is 195 calories. That’s from doing a simple Google search for calories in a glass of red wine and calories in a doughnut. Not surprisingly, calories in doughnuts vary widely, and according to a list on Calorie Lab can range from around 100 to nearly 400, and apparently Krispy Kreme doughnuts are even higher, ranging from 200 to 400.

Alcohol Justice included a link with their tweet to a story at Redbrick, a student publication from the University of Birmingham in England. That’s also where they snagged the photo of the glass of wine. Who knows where the pile of doughnuts came from.

The article AJ is using for their own purposes, Should Alcohol Show Calories?, has its own share of inconsistencies, not that they’d matter to Alcohol Justice. Redbrick states that a “large glass of wine is about 200 calories, which is the same as a doughnut” but then, of course, it links to a British drinks calculator showing that a standard glass of wine is 175 ml, or less than 6 ounces. So to make their analogy of a doughnut and a glass of wine being equivalent they have to pour a larger glass than is considered the standard amount. Naturally, AJ ignores that and even tries their best to make it appear that drinking a small glass of wine is like eating almost a dozen doughnuts, at least that’s the visual message they’re sending.

I had hoped we’d see more honesty from the prohibitionists in 2015, but I guess that was a foolish hope on my part. I think I need a doughnut, or maybe a Sierra Nevada Pale Ale, which at 175 calories is still less than my glazed doughnut.

Patent No. 3295988A: Preparation Of Reconstituted Beer

By

patent-logo
Today in 1967, US Patent 3295988 A was issued, assigned to Phillips Petroleum, for a “Preparation of Reconstituted Beer.” According to the application the invention “relates to a method of concentrating solutions by crystallization. In another aspect it relates to an improved method of using a crystal purification column for the removal of water from beer. In a further aspect it relates to an improved method of concentrating aqueous solutions, e.g., beer, and reconstituting the resulting concentrate.”

US3295988-0