Beer Birthday: Des De Moor

April 20, 2026 By Jay Brooks Leave a Comment

Today would have been the 65th birthday of Des de Moor, who was a London-based freelance beer writer who passed away in March of this year. I honestly can’t recall exactly when we met, but we’d been judging together at beer competitions and attending other beer events around the world for a number of years, and Des was great fun to share a pint with. He was also the author of the CAMRA Guide to London’s Best Beer Pubs & Bars. Join me in drinking a toast to Des de Moor tonight with your favorite English ale.

Historic Beer Birthday: Joseph Bramah

April 13, 2026 By Jay Brooks Leave a Comment

Today is the birthday of Joseph Bramah (April 13, 1748-December 9, 1814). Bramah was an English engineer, and inventor, whose most famous invention was the hydraulic press. But he also made improvements and created a practical beer engine, creating his beer pump and engine inventions between 1785 and 1797.

Another summary of his achievements is quite flattering:

English engineer and inventor whose lock manufacturing shop was the cradle of the British machine-tool industry. Central in early Victorian lockmaking and manufacturing, he influenced almost every mechanical trade of the time. Like Henry Ford, his influence was probably greater for the manufacturing processes he developed, than the product itself. He took out his first patent on a safety lock (1784) and in 1795 he patented his hydraulic press, known as the Bramah press, used for heavy forging. He devised a numerical printing machine for bank notes and was one of the first to suggest the practicability of screw propellers and of hydraulic transmission. He invented milling and planing machines and other machine tools, a beer-engine (1797), and a water-closet.

As for the actual patents, there were two of them. The first was in 1785 and was for what he called a “beer pump.” Then, in 1793 he was granted Patent No. 2196 for his improved version, now referred to as a “beer engine.” It was actually a Dutchman, John Lofting, who had first invented the beer pump in 1688, but Bramah’s were more refined and practical, and more importantly, patented. Curiously, Grace’s Guide to British Industrial History lists the patent dates as 1787 and 1797, so it’s unclear which are the correct dates.

In this engraving, entitled Men of Science Living in 1807-8, Bramah is on the left side, the tenth one in the back from the left. He’s the one with the wide sash across his chest and the star-shaped badge on his jacket. Others include Joseph Banks, Henry Cavendish and James Watt.

Engraving after ‘Men of Science Living in 1807-8’

There’s even a J.D. Wetherspoon’s pub in his home town of Bramley called The Joseph Bramah

Historic Beer Birthday: Ralph Thrale

April 9, 2026 By Jay Brooks Leave a Comment

Today is the birthday of Ralph Thrale (1698-April 9, 1758). Thrale’s exact date of birth is not known, but he died today in 1758, so that’s why I’m celebrating his birthday today. He was born in Offley, Hertfordshire, England, the son of Ralph Thrale, a Cottager originally from Sandridge who moved to Offley. His uncle brought him to London around 1711 after his father died (when he was only 13) to work at his Anchor Brewery, in Southwark, in the central part of the city, and eventually he became the Master of The Brewers Company, having bought the brewery after his uncle’s death. He was also a Member of Parliament from 1741-1747 and also High Sheriff for Surrey from 1733-34.

Portrait of Ralph Thrale by Thomas Hudson.

This is his short biography from the History of Parliament:

The son of ‘a hardworking man at Offley’, Thrale was brought to London by his uncle, Edmund Halsey, the owner of the Anchor brewery at Southwark, who ‘said he would make a man of him, and did so but … treated him very roughly’, making him work ‘at six shillings a week for twenty years’. He soon ‘made himself so useful … that the weight of the business fell entirely on him’, and he was expected to succeed to the brewery.1 But he fell out with his uncle by marrying ‘a wench that Halsey wanted to have for his own pleasure’, and was cut off.2On Halsey’s death in 1729, the Anchor brewery was put up for sale. According to Mrs. Piozzi, Thrale’s daughter-in-law,
to find a purchaser for so large a property was a difficult matter, and after some time, it was suggested that it would be advisable to treat with Thrale, a sensible, active, honest man, who had been long employed in the house, and to transfer the whole to him for £30,000, security being taken upon the property. This was accordingly settled. In eleven years Thrale paid the purchase money. He acquired a large fortune. But what was most remarkable was the liberality with which he used his riches.
Returned as an opposition Whig for Southwark, the brewers’ constituency, he voted against the Government on the chairman of the elections committee in 1741 and on the Hanoverians in 1744, was absent from other recorded divisions, did not stand again, and died 8 Apr. 1758.

thrale_brewery_circa_1785 — Thrale’s Anchor Brewery around 1785.

This mention of Ralph Thrale’s involvement in the Anchor Brewery is from “A History of Beer and Brewing,” by Ian Spencer Hornsey:

This is the entry for Barclay, Perkins & Co. Ltd, which at one time had been Thrale’s Anchor Brewery, from “The Brewing Industry: A Guide to Historical Records,” edited by Lesley Richmond, Alison Turton, published in 1990:

anchor-brewery-c1820-john-thomas-smith-1766-1833 — The Anchor Brewery around 1820.

And finally, the famous English writer Charles Dickens, during the period when he was writing many of his major works, “he was also the publisher, editor, and a major contributor to the journals Household Words (1850–1859) and All the Year Round (1858–1870). In “Volume V, from March 30, 1861 to September 21, 1861,” in a piece entitled “Queen of the Blue Stockings,” from April 20, 1861, Ralph Thrale is mentioned in a history of the Barclay Perkins brewery to give context to his tale:

LondonSE1BarclayPerkinsAnchorPlaque2_SP_Mar10 — A marker where Thrale’s brewery once stood in central London.

Historic Beer Birthday: Thomas Dawes

April 8, 2026 By Jay Brooks Leave a Comment

Today is the birthday of Thomas Dawes (April 8, 1785-February 11, 1863). He was born in Ambleside, Cumbria, England, but emigrated to Canada in 1808, eventually settling in Montreal. After working in breweries, he founded the Dawes Brewing around 1811 and it remained in the family until 1952.

This biography of Dawes is from the Musee de Lachine website in Montreal, Quebec’s exhibition on Black Horse Beer entitled “Pour boire il faut vendre” (To get a drink you have to sell):”

Born in Ambleside, England, Thomas Dawes (about 1775-1863) was the eldest of six children. He arrived in Canada in his early thirties, in 1808. In 1811, he settled in the area of Montréal called Côte des Argoulets (today’s Verdun borough), where he found work at a brewery run by Joseph Chapman. The brewing business suited him, it seems, since it became his lifelong career.

Thomas Dawes married Charlotte Weller in 1817, with Joseph Chapman and James Ogilvie as witnesses. The Dawes and Ogilvie families appear to have been friends. The connection was confirmed a few years later when, on April 21, 1826, Thomas Dawes and his associate Archibald Ogilvie bought from Stephen Finchlay a parcel of land southwest of Montréal, near what is now 28th Avenue in Lachine. Banking on his experience, Dawes set out to operate a farm and a brewery on the 4-acre by 30-acre lot.

This account of the brewery and the Dawes family is a Google translation from “Historie du Quebec:”

The name Dawes evokes one of the most famous breweries in Quebec. It was in 1811 that Thomas Dawes founded the Dawes Brewery, which was Lachine’s first industrial enterprise. Dawes is the third brewery on the island of Montreal, after the Molson brewery , founded in 1786, and the Dunn brewery , which appeared in 1809.
The Dawes Brewery is a family business, and no less than four generations of Dawes manage it, before selling the company to Canadian Breweries.
After Thomas Dawes, his sons James P. Dawes and Thomas A. Dawes took over. The third generation is represented by Andrew J. Dawes and James P. Dawes Jr. The fourth, by Norman Dawes, who has run the brewery for decades. But he sold it in 1952.
The Dawes were involved in the development of Lachine. Indeed, Thomas A. Dawes was mayor of Lachine from 1868 to 1869, while Andrew J. Dawes held this position from 1888 to 1893. It was the Dawes who funded the foundation of the Lachine General Hospital and of several churches , the tram network and the installation of the first Lachine telegraph line.
In addition, the Dawes family was among the founders of the Société d’Assurance Automobile du Québec , created in 1904 under the name of the Automobile Club of Canada . Andrew J. Dawes also headed Bell Canada, the Merchant Bank and other large companies. In addition, the Dawes imported and raised black percherons and contributed to the improvement of this horse breed. It will be remembered that it was Percherons who ensured the delivery of the beer and that they thus became the symbol of the Dawes brewery thanks to Black Horse beer .
In 1862, the Dawes built their imposing family home in Lachine (which was not sold until 1940). Around the Dawes area, large fields were devoted to the cultivation of barley and hops.
The decline of the Dawes brewery began in 1909, when sixteen Quebec breweries merged into the National Breweries Ltd. consortium. But the Dawes Brewery survived this ordeal, even if the company felt the effects of American prohibition in the 1920s. In 1939, it became the Dawes Black Horse Brewery, recalling its most famous beer.
In 1944, the Dawes proposed a merger with Molson, but the latter refused for fear of establishing a monopoly. The National Breweries Ltd. consortium was finally sold in 1952. It was bought by Canadian Breweries . The group is renamed Dow Brewery (moreover, the Dow Brewery had already existed for years, it was the designation for the whole consortium). The Dawes Black Horse Brewery disappears, as does the great Dawes dynasty. The Dow has long become one of the most popular brands among Quebecers, but that’s another story.

Historic Beer Birthday: Charles Duff

April 7, 2026 By Jay Brooks Leave a Comment

Today is the birthday of Charles Duff (April 7, 1894–October 15, 1966). He was primarily known as “an Irish author of books on language learning,” although his most famous book was “A Handbook of Hanging,” which also covered “electrocution, decapitations, gassings, innocent men executed and botched executions.” He was an interesting, eclectic person, to say the least, and a couple of years ago Gary Gillman did a nice job summarizing his quirky life in a post entitled “Charles Duff on the Circa-1950s Irish Pub.”

But he also wrote a few travel guides, including one called “Ireland and the Irish,” published in 1952. In it, he starts with Irish history and its folklore, in fact spending nearly 100 pages of the 282-page book, before actually suggesting what the reader should see in Ireland.

Duff also had a lot to say about beer in Ireland at the time, and it’s fascinating to see his views over 75 years later. Gillman also analyzes his writing historically and reprints some of his great writing, and you should read that, too, but I’m also sharing my favorite passages from Duff regarding the beer.

In discussing Dublin, Duff attempts to provide an image of the typical modern Dublin pub, and describes a place I’d certainly like to visit.

The atmosphere is cocktailish, the seats are most comfortable, the carpets soft. I did not find the drinks or service any less efficient, nor, I must say in fairness, any more efficient than in the old days when, before Dublin was really awake in the morning, a kindly and sympathetic barman diagnosed your hangover and might prescribe, as he did for me on one occasion, a seidlitz powder, telling me not to drink anything alcoholic before noon, when he recommended a dozen oysters and a bottle or two of stout “to settle the inside and get back the feelings of a Christian.” Today the atmosphere is convivial and friendly, and you will get a good drink there. But when you go out into the street you will not have the feelings we had after a session there. I think the main difference is that in the old days the drinkers in ‘Davy Byrne’s’ had a higher opinion of one another than they have now. And in the old days you sat on any sort of old chair with a pint in front of you on a very plain table and knew that there was no other pub quite like this. It is almost ill- mannered to make the comparison, and perhaps unfair to the present house which, after all, is not responsible for the age in which we live.

Another interesting insight about Dublin, is that you should read some Joyce before your visit.

It is not a bad preparation for a visit to Dublin to read James Joyce’s Dubliners, Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man, and Ulysses—in that order if you have not already read Joyce. On your second visit, or perhaps on some later occasion, you can have a try at Finnegan’s Wake, which a Dublin friend assures me is best read by moonlight as you lean over one of the Liffey bridges, and preferably while in that state of imaginative gestation to which a reasonable consumption of the wine of the country—Guinness’s Stout—is conducive. But you will not need any of this preparation to tell you that Dubliners are not always easy people to understand, and experience of Ireland can lead you to the conclusion that it is more difficult to grasp and analyse the mentality of the Dubliner than of any other kind or class of native. For one thing, Dubliners are a more mixed breed than you will find anywhere in Ireland, because Dublin has been a cosmopoli- tan community longer than any other in Ireland. This ‘town of the ford of the hurdles’ had its original Picts, Celtic Irish, its Norsemen, its Normans and then its English as the principal elements in its ethnic constitution. It has also had a generous sprinkling of the adventurous; and of the adven- turers, military, political and commercial, who invariably find their way to promising territories. In Dublin you will find surnames which come direct or are derived from those of almost every country and race in Europe; one cannot say this of any other Irish city or town.

Duff’s other travel guide was called “England and the English,” in which he followed a similar format as his Irish guidebook. This one was published a few years later, in 1955. Gillman also analyzes Duff’s English writing, too, in a two-part post entitled Charles Duff Eulogises the English Pub – Part I, which primarily provides context and background to the 1950s climate in which Duff was writing. But in Part II he tackles Duff’s take on the Eglish pub.

But I’m more interested in just sharing his stories. Like his previous work, it is filled with interesting anecdotes about like in England, with this one from an experience in World War II involving beer and cider being particularly funny.

By way of final warning, I can tell of an episode I am not likely to forget. There was a shortage of beer in the last years of the Second World War when I was staying at the cottage in Devon. That did not greatly worry local people; they drank their local cider. But very often the American troops stationed in the neighbourhood suffered distress from the lack of alcohol and (I suspect, somewhat to their disgust) were driven back on cider, which they contemptuously regarded as a soft drink 1 Friendly patrons of the pub advised them to ‘take it easy’ until they got used to it. But those hearties just laughed, possibly regarding the civilian adviser as needlessly timid; and they just went ahead. At about the third mug the fun began then the cider started to have effect. Another mug or two and the balloon went up. The usual effects of strong alcohol were felt : in this case of an alcoholic beverage to which those strong, healthy men were quite unaccustomed. We all felt sorry for them, and for their poor heads next day. And as, one by one they rolled off, the locals smiled and called for another mug saying: “Don’t it just show ‘ee !”
My friend would often reminisce and philosophize about cider, telling me that farm-workers used to have little barrels (he later showed me his; it held about a pint and a half) which they took with them to their work, but that the young genera- tion know nothing of this. He thought that modern cider is better and purer than that of his youth. He had known of men who drank themselves to death on cider, but insisted that this is rare; because, he said, cider is one of those rare drinks which carries its own safety-point and, when that point has been reached depending on the drinker’s capacity and head there is no inclination to drink any more. “How very con- venient!” the conservative drinker will say. The illustrious may comment: “How awful! ” There it is.

Duff discusses pubs more generally when covering the “prosperous market-town of Bishop’s Stortford (about thirty miles from London) is on the River Stort, which forms the boundary with Essex.”

It was precisely this easy-going atmosphere which I liked about Bishop’s Stortford. With it goes a great variety of friendly pubs Herts is a good county for beer some of which confront the traveller unexpectedly, and inside are found to be just the sort of typical little country pubs one reads about. You can find a pub almost anywhere in the town. There are the major houses such as the ‘George* and the ‘Chequers’, but I felt attracted by old names such as:

The Feathers
The Falcon
The Anchor
The Swan
The Grapes
The Reindeer
The Boar’s Head
The Half Moon
The Rising Sun
The Castle The Royal Oak
The Bull
The Fox
The Bricklayers’ Arms

most of them with their colourful, interesting signs. The names I have listed do not exhaust the possibilities of Bishop’s Stortford, and merely represent what I recall easily. The little ‘Bricklayers’ Arms’ on the road to Hadham had just received a fresh coat of paint the last time I was there. I thought it looked a very beautiful little pub from outside. Inside I was not disappointed: the beer was delicious, and Mrs. Morgan, the landlady, a great personality whom I am not likely to forget.
I should like to dwell on these pubs, some of which are very old, because of their importance as an institution of considerable import in the social fabric of this country. Hertfordshire, and, indeed, all of this eastern area, can provide examples of more than ordinary interest. At St. Albans there is the ‘Fighting Cocks’, which is said to be the oldest inhabited licensed house in England. Thomas Burke mentions A.D. 795 as the date of its foundation. “The traveller by car who takes the Great North Road the historic highway linking London with Edinburgh will come upon many pub signs which will inevitably attract his attention and often make him stop for a closer scrutiny. A little conversation with landlords and know- ledgeable local people will quickly show that the English public-house (as we usually call it now), with which one may include the terms ‘inn’ and ‘tavern’, embraces a vast social his- tory that can be traced back to Saxon times. For over one thou- sand years the house which provides food and drink for the traveller and wayfarer, and a centre or dub for local people, has been a part of English life. If I have not mentioned the subject until now, it is not because other areas of England are less rich in public-houses than this eastern part, but merely that it falls in more conveniently at this stage. What I say about the pubs here can be paralleled for most parts of England and, as it is, I can deal with it only in the most summary way. Take, for example, the ‘Letchworth Hair at Letchworth, formerly a manor-house and, some may say, too much of an hotel to be considered as a ‘typical’ pub. It is mentioned in Domesday Book. And the ‘Sun’ at Hitchin, which was used by the Parliamentarians during the Civil War (1642-1648), and, in 1745, was the place in which North Hertfordshire men enrolled for the Resistence Movement that was to face the advancing army of the Pretender. Some of these old buildings are architecturally and artistically extremely interesting, externally or internally, and sometimes in both senses. As we move northwards, a slight detour takes us to Buckden and Huntingdon, both in Huntingdonshire. The first town has the ‘Lion’ with a lounge beautifully adorned by some magnificent oak beams; the second town has the ‘George’, with its long frontage and a lovely row of fifteen windows. Stilton, where one of the world’s great cheeses is made, has the ‘Bell’ dating back to the spacious days when men travelled on horseback, more often than not in companies in order to be able to cope with the activities of such gentry as Dick Turpin. Lincolnshire has some noteworthy houses: the ‘George’ at Stamford where, in 1746, William Duke of Cumberland put up after his victory over Bonnie Prince Charlie at Culloden; and the curiously named ‘Ram Jam Inn’, a haunt of Dick Turpin and his men. At Grantham there is another ‘George’, visited by Charles Dickens in 1838 and about which he wrote to his wife, “. . . the most comfortable inn I ever put up in”. In Grantham there is also the ancient ‘Angel and Royal’ with seven hundred years of history behind it and originally a favourite house of the Knights Templars. Kings held their courts there; the present building dates from about the middle of the i4th century. These few dips will indicate the scope of the subject, but I think I have said sufficient to show the reader that the English pub is a very old, very strong institution and in every way worthy of his attention. I have never yet entered a pub, however humble, from which I did not emerge refreshed in mind and body, and I think that a good argument could be put up in favour of the pub as the most characteristic institution of the people of England: of the men, that is, for it is only in comparatively recent years that women are frequenting licensed premises with the approval of the younger generation of men, of course, but often with the strong disapproval of old regulars. To these it is unbecoming to the spirit and atmosphere of their club that lively and frivolous girls the more attractive they are, the worse it is ! often in slacks or even shorts, should lower the serious tone of the establishment with their disconcerting jazzing, crooning and giggling. This little survival of Puritanism is quickly passing and in many places no longer exists. It will soon be gone. The pub will survive by adapting itself to the social environment: as it always has done in the past.

He also stresses that one should never discuss politics or religion in a pub, good advice now as then.

Again it comes back to the desire for political stability, for if there is one thing that the English have learnt by bitter experience, it is that nothing can cause greater disturbances than religion, especially when used for a political end. A man’s religion is his own affair. Hence, in conversation it is never even discussed! The unwritten law of the English pub is: No religion.

Duff-hanging — Still his most famous work.

Historic Beer Birthday: Henry Thrale

April 4, 2026 By Jay Brooks

Nobody’s sure exactly when the birthday of Henry Thrale is, not even the year is certain. He may have been born in 1724 or it may have been 1720. He did, however, die on April 4, 1781. He was the son of brewer Ralph Thrale (1698–1758), who bought the Anchor Brewery in Southwark, London, England in 1729. Henry Thrale became the owner when his father died. By “the early nineteenth century it was the largest brewery in the world. From 1781 [after Henry Thrale died] it was operated by Barclay Perkins & Co, who merged with Courage in 1955. The brewery was demolished in 1981.”

This is his basic biography from his Wikipedia page:

Henry Thrale was a British politician who sat in the House of Commons from 1765 to 1780. He was a close friend of Samuel Johnson. Like his father, he was the proprietor of the large London brewery, H. Thrale & Co.
Born at the Alehouse in Harrow Corner, Southwark, he was the son of the rich brewer Ralph Thrale (1698–1758) and Mary Thrale. He married Hester Lynch Salusbury on 11 October 1763; they had 12 children, and she outlived him. He was MP for Southwark 23 December 1765 – September 1780, an Alderman, and Sheriff of the City of London: a respected, religious man who was a good hunter and sportsman with a taste for gambling.

Historic Beer Birthday: Thomas Fowell Buxton

April 1, 2026 By Jay Brooks

Today is the birthday of Thomas Fowell Buxton (April 1, 1786–February 19, 1845). He was “an English Member of Parliament, brewer, abolitionist and social reformer.” While he’s best remembered today for his role in abolishing slavery in England, he was also involved in the brewing business. “In 1808, Buxton’s Hanbury family connections led to an appointment to work at the brewery of Truman, Hanbury & Company, in Brick Lane, Spitalfields, London. In 1811 he was made a partner in the business, renamed Truman, Hanbury, Buxton & Co. Later he became sole owner.”

Naturally, Martyn Cornell has written about Buxton and his brewery in a post entitled When Brick Lane was home to the biggest brewery in the world. Here’s the part that mentions Fowell Buxton:

In 1808 [Sampson] Hanbury’s nephew, Thomas Fowell Buxton, son of Thomas Fowell Buxton of Earl’s Colne, Essex, and Anna Hanbury, joined the brewery, aged 21 or 22. Buxton (who was not a Quaker, though his wife was) became a partner in 1811, at the age of 25, with a 1/12th share, bringing the last element to what would eventually, by 1827, be called Truman, Hanbury, Buxton and Company. By now the Black Eagle brewery was making 142,179 barrels of beer a year, some 20,000 barrels more than Whitbread, but a long way behind the number two London brewer, Meux Reid in Liquorpond Street, near Clerkenwell, on 220,000 barrels, and trailing Barclay Perkins in Southwark, on 264,405 barrels a year, by a large margin.
Buxton’s wife was one of the Gurneys of the Norwich bank, and a cousin of Sampson’s wife Agatha. A few years after he became a partner, in 1815, the shares in the brewery were redivided into 41 slices, and Buxton, evidently after bringing in some extra capital to the firm, increased his share to 8/41ths. His greatest gift to the brewery was sorting out the management of a concern that, by 1815, owned 200 pubs outright and financed another 300 landlords. But he also successfully intervened to prevent a disaster that might have destroyed the business.

And here’s the account from the Wikipedia page on the Black Eagle Brewery:

Sir Benjamin died in March 1780 and, without a son to take on the business, it passed to his grandsons. In 1789, the brewery was taken over by Sampson Hanbury (Hanbury had been a partner since 1780; the Truman family became ‘sleeping partners’). Hanbury’s nephew, Thomas Fowell Buxton, joined the company in 1808, improved the brewing process, converted the works to steam power and, with the rapid expansion and improvement of Britain’s road and rail transport networks, the Black Eagle label soon became famous across Britain (by 1835, when Buxton took over the business upon Hanbury’s death, the brewery was producing some 200,000 barrels (32,000 m3) of porter a year).
The Brick Lane brewery – now known as Truman, Hanbury, Buxton & Co – took on new partners in 1816, the Pryor brothers (the company’s owners were renowned for their good treatment of their workers – providing free schooling – and for their support of abolitionism). By 1853 the brewery was the largest in the world, producing 400,000 barrels of beer each year, with a site covering six acres.
However, the company also faced competition from breweries based outside London – notably in Burton upon Trent, where the water was particularly suitable for brewing – and in 1873 the company acquired a brewery (Phillips) in Burton and began to build a major new brewery, named the Black Eagle after the original London site.
In 1888, Truman, Hanbury, Buxton & Co became a public company with shareholders, but the balance of production was now shifting to Burton.
The Brick Lane brewery site covered six acres by 1898.
The Brick Lane facility remained active through a take-over by the Grand Metropolitan Group in 1971 and a merger with Watney Mann in 1972, but it was in terminal decline. It eventually closed in 1989.

Glenn Payne wrote the Truman, Hanbury, Buxton & Co. entry for the Oxford Companion to Beer:

Truman, Hanbury, Buxton & Co. was a venerable British brewery that operated for more than 3 centuries before it closed its doors in 1988. The original brewery was built on Lolsworth Field, Spitalhope, London, by Thomas Bucknall in 1669. He was soon joined by Joseph Truman, who became brewery manager in 1694. Joseph Truman brought Joseph Truman Jr into the company in 1716 and his executor, Sir Benjamin Truman, who took ownership of the business in 1722. Two years later a new brewery, The Black Eagle, was built on nearby Brick Lane, which grew to become Britain’s second largest brewery, employing some 1,000 people. Sir Benjamin died in 1780 without a direct male heir and left the brewery to his grandsons. In the same year, Sampson Hanbury became a partner and took over control in 1789. His nephew, Thomas Fowler Buxton, joined in 1808. He improved the brewing process by adopting innovations in brewing technology brought about by the Industrial Revolution. Outside his activities in the brewery, Buxton was a renowned philanthropist, and he was elected a member of Parliament in 1818. He was associated with William Wilberforce, a leader in the fight to end the British slave trade. By the time of his death in 1845, the brewery produced about 305,000 hl of porter annually. The brewery is even mentioned in Charles Dickens’ David Copperfield (1850). Seizing upon the growing influence of Burton as a brewing center in the 19th century, the company acquired the Phillips brewery there in 1887 and 2 years later became a public company. But its fortunes declined with the shift in popular taste away from porter toward pale ale near the end of the 19th century. In 1971, the brewery was acquired by the Grand Metropolitan Group, which, in turn, was merged into Watney Mann 1 year later. Thomas, Hanbury, and Buxton ceased production in 1988 but its brewery still stands on its site in Brick Lane, London, where it has been redeveloped into a complex of residential housing, offices, restaurants, galleries, and shops.

And here’s an account of his entire life, from the Encyclopedia Britannica:

Sir Thomas Fowell Buxton, 1st Baronet, (born April 1, 1786, Castle Hedingham, Essex, England—died February 19, 1845, near Cromer, Norfolk), British philanthropist and politician who, in 1822, succeeded William Wilberforce as leader of the campaign in the House of Commons for the abolition of slavery in the British colonies and thus was partly responsible for the Abolition Act of August 28, 1833.
A brother-in-law of the prison reformer Elizabeth Fry, Buxton, in 1818, published his own Inquiry into Prison Discipline, based on his inspection of Newgate Prison, London. In 1823 he joined Wilberforce and others in founding the British and Foreign Anti-Slavery Society. The ideas he expressed in The African Slave Trade and Its Remedy (1839) inspired the British government to send an expedition to the Niger River Delta in 1841. Intended to make anti-slave-trade treaties with the peoples of the area, to engage in other kinds of trade, and to establish a missionary headquarters, the expedition suffered many deaths from fever and was soon recalled. Although Buxton did not accompany the group, his own health was permanently affected by the shock of the failure of the project. He was made a baronet in 1840.

And this is from the Abolition Project:

Sir Thomas Fowell Buxton was born in Essex in 1786. He was privately educated and went to Trinty College, Dublin. He became a close friend of Joseph Gurney after his mother (a Quaker) introduced him to the Norfolk based family.
He started to attend Quaker meetings with the Gurney family and married Joseph’s sister, Hannah, in 1807. He became a partner in a brewing company and became involved in several campaigns for social reform. Another of Joseph’s sisters was Elizabeth Fry and Buxton became involved in her campaign for prison reform.
In 1818, Buxton was elected MP for Weymouth, a position he held until 1837. He was a strong advocate for the abolition of slavery in the British Colonies. In 1823, he formed the Society for the Extinction of the Slave Trade, the committee that co-ordinated the campaign for total abolition. In 1824, he succeeded William Wilberforce as head of the anti-slavery party in Parliament, continuing the struggle until the Slavery Abolition Act, in 1833, freed all enslaved people in the British Empire.
In 1838, Buxton published The African Slave Trade and Its Remedy. In this book, he told the British government to make treaties with rulers in Africa. An expedition was sent in 1841 to put the plan into action but it failed, mainly because of the large number of deaths among the expedition members from yellow fever and malaria.
You can read an account of this expedition in White Dreams, Black Africa: Antislavery Expedition to the Niger, 1841-42 by Howard Temperley, 1991.
Thomas Fowell Buxton was made a Baron in 1840 and is famous for

saying. “With Ordinary talent and extraordinary perseverance, all things are attainable.”

Historic Beer Birthday: Gilbert Greenall

March 30, 2026 By Jay Brooks

greenalls
Today is the birthday of Gilbert Greenall (March 30, 1867-October 24, 1938). He “was the son of Sir Gilbert Greenall, 1st Baronet. The family’s wealth was based on the brewing business established by Greenall’s great-grandfather Thomas Greenall in 1762 (which later became the Greenall’s Group PLC) [and which now is part of the De Vere hotel operator]. His father also had large interests in canals and banking. Greenall succeeded his father in the baronetcy in 1894 and notably served as High Sheriff of Cheshire in 1907, being appointed a deputy lieutenant the same year. In 1927 he was raised to the peerage as Baron Daresbury, of Walton in the County of Chester.

Lord Daresbury married Frances Eliza, daughter of Captain Edward Wynne Griffith, in 1900. He died in October 1938, aged 71, and was succeeded in his titles by his son Edward. Lady Daresbury died in 1953.”

NPG x166985; Gilbert Greenall, 1st Baron Daresbury

Here’s a history of the brewery, from Wikipedia:

Greenall’s Brewery was founded by Thomas Greenall in 1762. Initially based in St Helens, the company relocated to Warrington in 1787.
It bought the Groves & Whitnall Brewery in Salford in 1961, Shipstone’s Brewery in Nottingham in 1978 and Davenport’s Brewery in Birmingham in 1986. For much of the 20th century, the company traded as Greenall Whitley & Co Limited. The St Helens brewery was demolished in the 1970s to make way for a new shopping centre. The Warrington brewery on the edge of Stockton Heath was bought by Bruntwood, renamed Wilderspool Business Park and is now let to office occupiers.
The company ceased brewing in 1991 to concentrate on running pubs and hotels.
In 1999, the tenanted wing of the Greenall’s operation was sold to the Japanese bank, Nomura for £370 million[7] and the main Greenall’s operation, involving 770 pubs and 69 budget lodges, was sold to Scottish and Newcastle for £1.1billion. Greenalls started to focus its resources on its De Vere and Village Leisure hotel branding at that time.
In February 2005, Greenalls sold The Belfry to The Quinn Group for £186 million.
The Greenall family connection remained as Lord Daresbury, the descendant of the original founder, remained the non-executive chairman. This tie was severed in 2006 when Daresbury stepped down from the post and much of the family’s interest was sold.

And this is from Funding Universe:

Patriarch Thomas Greenall learned the brewing trade from his wife’s family in the 1750s and founded his own brewery in northwestern England at St. Helens in 1762. Brewing was a highly competitive business, with rivals ranging from the lone homebrewer to inns and pubs that brewed their own ales to wholesale brew masters like Greenall. Though the founder dabbled in nail making, coal mining, and yarn spinning throughout the late 18th century, brewing remained the family’s core interest. By the turn of the century, Thomas had brought sons Edward, William, and Peter into the business. The Greenalls began to purchase their own pubs and inns as early as 1800, helping to accelerate a gradual elimination of their competition. In Britain, it was customary for bars owned by breweries to carry only the beers brewed by the parent company. For nearly two centuries, these “tied houses” were a profitable segment of Greenall’s business.
In 1788, Greenall formed a separate partnership with William Orrett and Thomas Lyon to purchase the Saracen’s Head Brewery in nearby Wilderspool. Business was so good that within just three years the three partners undertook a £4,400 expansion of the operation.
The family business interests endured a rapid succession of generations in the first two decades of the 19th century. In 1805, both Thomas Greenall and William Orrett died. By 1817, the passing of William and Peter Greenall left only Edward to operate the growing St. Helens brewery. Just a year later, Thomas Lyon died. His nephew and heir, also Thomas, was interested in the Wilderspool brewery only as an investment. In 1818, 60-year-old Edward assigned eldest son Thomas to manage the family’s half interest in Wilderspool and charged younger son Peter with management of the family brewery at St. Helens.
While Peter pursued politics, eventually winning election to Parliament, Thomas proved to be the brewer of his generation. By this time, the family businesses had grown to the point that the Greenalls served as chairmen, guiding the overall direction of the company but leaving daily management concerns to other top executives. Throughout this period, ownership of the pubs and inns through which Greenall’s porters, sparkling ales, and bitters were dispensed was a key to maintaining a strong competitive position.

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And this is Greenall Whitley & Co’s., Wilderspool Brewery, in Warrington in 1887.

And continuing Funding Universe’s history, this portion, entitled “Consolidation of Family Holdings in Mid-19th Century” is where Gilbert comes in and runs the company:

When both Peter and Thomas died in the late 1840s, their younger brother, Parliamentarian Gilbert Greenall, inherited the family’s St. Helens and Wilderspool holdings. Gilbert appointed his nephew, John Whitley, to manage the Wilderspool brewery in 1853 and set out himself to rebuild, retool, and enlarge the St. Helens operation mid-decade.
Longtime silent partner Thomas Lyon died in 1859 and his estate sold his stake in the Wilderspool brewery to Gilbert Greenall, making the Greenall family the sole owners of both the St. Helens and the Wilderspool operations. Gilbert marked the occasion by changing the unified firm’s name to Greenall & Company. Not long thereafter, Greenalls eliminated its last major local competitor by acquiring the Dentons Green Brewery in St. Helens. In 1880, Gilbert (who was made a baronet in 1876 by Queen Victoria) merged the St. Helens and Wilderspool breweries as Greenall Whitley & Company Limited and installed himself as the corporation’s first chairman. Though operating under the same corporate umbrella, the two houses retained their separate identities and brands. By 1882, Greenall’s annual sales volume totaled nearly 90,000 barrels of beer and the company owned about 200 pubs.
Sir Gilbert guided the expansion and modernization of the Wilderspool brewery as well as a flurry of acquisitions in the waning years of the 19th century. His four-year, £6,750 modernization program brought in state-of-the-art brewing and bottling equipment, upgraded the company’s railway access, and expanded the operation’s office space. Acquisitions included the Halewood, Richardson’s, and Spring breweries, bringing with them more than two dozen pubs. A rapid series of untimely deaths accelerated the family’s succession plans when in the space of just two years both Sir Gilbert and his second-in-command, Peter Whitley, died, propelling the chairman’s son, also Gilbert, into the leadership of two growing breweries at the young age of 27.
The new chairman suffered a trial by fire in the first two decades of the 20th century. He began the transition from horse-drawn transportation to gasoline-driven vehicles as early as 1908, adopting some of the first vehicles of their type. World War I brought extreme deprivation to the United Kingdom. Rationing of all foods–including brewing ingredients–and manpower shortages made this period a difficult one for Greenall Whitley, but the company emerged from the conflict unscathed.

The Greenall, Whitley & Co. Ltd. Brewery, in St. Helens, in 1902.
Greenall Whitley resumed its acquisition strategy in the period between the World Wars, purchasing nine pubs in 1919 alone. Four years later, the brewery diversified into wine and liquors through the acquisition of Gilbert & John Greenall Limited, a distillery owned by another branch of the family. Though the business remained concentrated in the northwest region of Britain, acquisitions gave Greenall Whitley a growing share of the area’s breweries and pubs in the early 1930s. The purchase of three operations in as many years added nearly 90 ale houses and inns to the company roster.
After four decades as chairman, Lord Gilbert Greenall (who had been given the hereditary title First Baron Daresbury of Walton by King George V in 1927) died in 1938, passing leadership of Greenall Whitley to his son Edward. In his nine years of service to the company, Edward made a special effort to restore and preserve the company’s historic pubs, as well as maintain high standards of quality in the breweries.

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The St. Helens brewery in the 1930s.

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Historic Beer Birthday: Michael Jackson

March 27, 2026 By Jay Brooks

Today would have been Michael Jackson’s 84th birthday (March 27, 1942–August 30, 2007). I first met Michael in the early 1990s, shortly after my first beer book was published. He is all but single-handedly responsible for the culture of better beer that exists today. He began writing about good beer in the 1960s and 70s and his writing has influenced (and continues to influence) generations of homebrewers and commercial brewers, many of whom were inspired to start their own breweries by his words. There are few others, if any, that have been so doggedly persistent and passionate about spreading the word about great beer. I know some of my earliest knowledge and appreciation of beer, and especially its history and heritage, came from Michael’s writings. Michael passed away in August 2007, nearly 14 years ago. I still miss him, and I suspect I’m not the only one. A few years ago, J.R. Richards’ documentary film about Michael Jackson, Beer Hunter: The Movie, debuted, which I helped a tiny bit with as a pioneer sponsor.

I did an article several years ago for Beer Connoisseur, for their Innovator’s Series, entitled Michael Jackson: The King of Beer Writers, A personal look back at the man who made hunting for beer a career. I reached out to a number of people who also knew Michael for their remembrances as well as my own, and as a result I’m pretty pleased with the results (although the original draft was almost twice as long).

I’ll again be playing some jazz and having a pint of something yummy in his honor, which has become my tradition for March 27, which I’ve also started declaring to be “Beer Writers Day.” Join me in drinking a toast to Michael Jackson, the most influential modern beer writer who’s ever lived.

At GABF in 2005, still wearing the same glasses. But my, oh my, have I changed. Sheesh.

On stage accepting the first beer writing awards from the Brewers Association with Lisa Morrison, James DeWan (Chicago Tribune), Jim Cline, GM of Rogue, Stan Hieronymus, who writes Real Beer’s Beer Therapy among much else, and Ray Daniels, formerly of the Brewers Association.

With Carolyn Smagalski receiving an award at Pilsner Urquell.

With Jack Joyce at an Event in Rogue San Francisco.

Michael and me at the Great Divide Media Brunch way back when.

Beer Birthday: Steve Wellington

March 22, 2026 By Jay Brooks

Today is the 82nd birthday of Steve Wellington. He “started working for Bass in 1965, a year after the Worthington’s brewery was demolished, and brewed both Bass and Worthington’s beers. He left Bass to run his own business, teaching people how to brew at home, then returned in 1994 to run the White Shield microbrewery as part of the Brewing Museum in Burton. He brewed some of the beers Burton had lost: Worthington’s E, Imperial Stout, Barley Wine, and the legendary Worthington’s White Shield.” In 2007, he was named “Brewer of the Year’ by the All-Party Parliamentary Beer Group in 2007 and Guild of British Beer Writers’ Brewer of the Year in 2004. I met him shortly after that, when I visited Marston’s in Burton-on-Trent, accompanying Matt Brynildson on a trip to do a collaboration beer. He was very generous with his time and showed us around his brewery. He then retired several times, as many as five (according to Roger Protz), the last time in 2018. When he retired previously, in 2011, Pete Brown referred to him as the “Jedi Master Brewer of Worthington White Shield,” and that sums him up nicely. I’ve run into Steve at least one another time, and he’s a great person. Join me in wishing Steve a very happy birthday.