Tuesday’s ad is another one from the United Brewers Industrial Foundation, from 1945. This was the year before the “Beer Belongs” series began. These were similar, and used the “Beer Belongs” tagline, but were unnumbered stand-alones. They each featured a painting by a well-known artist or illustrator of the day, along with many of the elements that would later appear in the “Home Life in America” series. In this ad, the painting is called “Ski Trail,” by artist Marianne Appel.
Monday’s ad is another one from the United Brewers Industrial Foundation, from 1945. This was the year before the “Beer Belongs” series began. These were similar, and used the “Beer Belongs” tagline, but were unnumbered stand-alones. They each featured a painting by a well-known artist or illustrator of the day, along with many of the elements that would later appear in the “Home Life in America” series. In this ad, the painting is called “Quail Hunt,” by artist Julien Binford.
Sunday’s ad is for Michelob, from around 2000 (which is a guess, I can’t quite make out the year on the ad). Having just spent a few days in Denver judging at the Great American Beer Festival, this one’s a hoot. “What Beer Judges Drink Between Competitions.” Then at the bottom of the ad, there’s this. “If judging beer were your job, how would you spend your day off?” To which the answer is. “Enjoying the remarkably smooth taste of Michelob.” I confess that’s not what I was drinking after a long day of judging. You?
Saturday’s ad is another one from the United States Brewers Foundation, this one from 1941. As far as I know this one’s not from a specific series. The point of the ad is that for one book not worth reading you wouldn’t tear down an entire library, and likewise you wouldn’t condemn the entire beer industry for a few bad retailers. Of course, that’s exactly what prohibitionists due, extrapolating any behavior as not reflecting on the bad actor, but on the industry as a whole.
Friday’s ad is another one from the United States Brewers Foundation, from 1951. This a series of ads they did in 1951 using a Q&A format aimed at highlighting different positive aspects of beer and the brewing industry.
Q
How does the Brewing Industry compare to other industries as a taxpayer?
A
It ranks fourth in excise taxes alone, which amounts to almost $700,000,000 annually.
And as the ad points out, that’s in addition to “the many millions in property, income and corporation taxes paid” by breweries, not to mention state excise taxes.
Thursday’s ad is another one from the United States Brewers Foundation, from 1951. This a series of ads they did in 1951 using a Q&A format aimed at highlighting different positive aspects of beer and the brewing industry.
Q
How much does the Brewing Industry pay in state excise taxes?
A
Last year, state excise taxes on beer amounted to over $193 million.
And that’s in addition to the over $700 million in federal excise taxes, plus all of the other business taxes that every business pays.
Wednesday’s ad is another one from the United States Brewers Foundation, from 1951. This a series of ads they did in 1951 using a Q&A format aimed at highlighting different positive aspects of beer and the brewing industry.
Q
Were there any brewers among America’s founding fathers?
A
Yes. Samuel Adams — known as the “Father of the Revolution” — was a brewer in private life.
The ads talks about Adams “successfully” managing “the brewery that he inherited from Samuel Adams, Sr.” It seems more likely that at most he was a malster, and by all accounts not a particularly successful one. Although plenty of sources continue to claim he was a brewer, including several that claim he was a prosperous one, it seems more likely that he was not. The ad does say “in private life,” which could mean that he brewed for his household, at home, a not uncommon practice at the time.
Although there is more evidence that George Washington brewed beer, and Thomas Jefferson brewed later in life at Monticello, so the answer is still yes. Also, it seems likely that given that many households during colonial times brewed their own beer, that many other founders brewed beer, too.
Tuesday’s ad is another one from the United States Brewers Foundation, from 1951. This a series of ads they did in 1951 using a Q&A format aimed at highlighting different positive aspects of beer and the brewing industry.
Q
Did Christopher Columbus discover beer in America?
A
Yes, in 1502, he found it brewed by the natives of Central America.
I confess I missed this part of Columbus’ legacy, but according to the ad he reported that “Central American Indians made a brew … ‘of maize, resembling English beer.'”
Monday’s ad is another one from the United States Brewers Foundation, from 1951. This a series of ads they did in 1951 using a Q&A format aimed at highlighting different positive aspects of beer and the brewing industry.
Q
What products, besides beer, come from the Brewing Industry?
A
Vitamins, yeast and cattle feeds are important industry by-products.
Apparently brewing yeast is the best source of B vitamins every found, and it even may have rid the world of pellagra, “the dread diet-deficiency disease” that I’ve never heard of, although it persists in Africa, Indonesia, North Korea and China. Then there’s also spent grain given as feed for livestock, as common then as now.
Sunday’s ad is another one from the United States Brewers Foundation, from 1951. This a series of ads they did in 1951 using a Q&A format aimed at highlighting different positive aspects of beer and the brewing industry.
Q
How does the Brewing Industry compare in size to other industries?
A
It ranks eleventh* … with a dollar volume two-thirds that of the passenger-car industry in 1949.
The ad claims in 1951 there were “400 and more” breweries, characterized as most “small breweries” and it was the 11th biggest industry. Today we have over 3,000 mostly small breweries, and the total beer market is around $100 billion, as compared to $4.5 billion in 1949. But that doesn’t even put the brewing industry in the top twenty, at least according to a list I found on Wikipedia of “Industries by GDP value added 2011.” They also mentioned that their market was about 5 times larger than the “entire soft-drink industry,” which would have made soda less than $1 billion in 1949. Today, at least according to one source I found (Reportlinker) that the U.S. soft-drink industry was nearly $125 billion, making it larger today than beer (assuming the two figures are comparable). Though that doesn’t really surprise me, with soda being so ubiquitous in our society.
