Historic Beer Birthday: Louis Hemrich

May 15, 2025 By Jay Brooks

hemrich
Today is the birthday of Louis Hemrich (May 15, 1873-September 26, 1941). He was born in Wisconsin, and was the brother of Alvin M. Hemrich. Alvin bought the old Slorah Brewery in 1897 and operated it as the Alvin Hemrich Brewing Co. for six months, after which two of his brothers — Julius and Louis — joined him in the business and it became known as the Hemrich Brothers Brewing Co.

Here’s a short biography from Find-a-Grave:

Louis Hemrich was born to John and Katherine Anna (Koeppel) Hemrich on May 15, 1873, although some records say May 20, 1872.
His father and brothers began operating breweries in Seattle in 1878. Louis began his career as a bookkeeper for Bay View Brewing in Seattle. By 1900 he was partnered with his brothers Senator Andrew Hemrich and Alvin Hemrich in owning and running the Hemrich Brother’s Brewing Co. and the brewing operations it controlled. It was successful enough to send his wife on a trip to Europe in 1902, and join her on trips to Europe and Hong Kong in 1907 and 1908. In 1914 he was President of the Brewers’ Association of the Northwest, and active in lobbying against prohibition of alcohol in Washington. When it passed, the breweries moved to California and British Columbia.
Louis was president of the family brewing company from 1910 until about 3 years before his death.
He married Lizzie Hanna on May 10, 1897 in Seattle, WA, and was widowed in Oct. of 1918. It appears they did not have children. He married Mrs. Maude Etta Engel before Dec. 1923.

And here’s a fuller account of Hemrich from “A Volume of Memoirs and Genealogy of Representative Citizens of the City of Seattle and County of King, Washington,” published in 1903, as posted on Brewery Gems:

A Biographical record of the representative men of Seattle and King county would be incomplete and unsatisfactory without a personal and somewhat detailed mention of those whose lives are interwoven so closely with the industrial activities of this section. In the subject of this review, who is secretary and treasurer of the Hemrich Brothers Brewing Company, we find a young man of that progressive, alert and discriminating type through which has been brought about the magnificent commercial and material development of the Pacific northwest, and it is with satisfaction that we here note the more salient points in his honorable and useful career.
Louis Hemrich was born in the town of Alma, Buffalo county, Wisconsin, on the 20th of May, 1872, a son of John and Catherine (Koeppel) Hemrich, the former of whom was born in Baden, Germany, and the latter in Bavaria. They came to America and resided in Wisconsin for a number of years, removing thence to Seattle when the subject of this sketch was a lad of about fourteen years, his rudimentary educational training having been secured in the public schools of his native state, while he continued his studies thereafter in the public schools of Seattle, where he prepared himself for college. At the age of eighteen years he matriculated in the University of Washington, where he completed a commercial course. After leaving school Mr. Hemrich took a position as bookkeeper for the Seattle Brewing & Malting Company, where he remained for a period of three years and was then elected secretary and treasurer of the company, in which capacity he rendered most effective service for the ensuing two years. He then resigned this office and forthwith became associated with his brothers in the organization of the Hemrich Brothers Brewing Co., which was duly incorporated under the laws of the state. They erected a fine plant, where is produced a lager of the most excellent order, the purity, fine flavor and general attractiveness of the product giving it a high reputation, while the business is conducted upon the highest principles of honor and fidelity, so that its rapid expansion in scope and importance came as a natural sequel.
As a business man Mr. Hemrich has shown marked acumen and mature judgment, and his progressive ideas and his confidence in the future of his home city have been signalized by the investments which he has made in local realty and by the enterprise he has shown in the improving of his various properties. In 1901 he erected in the village of Ballard, a suburb of Seattle, a fine brick business block, located at the corner of First Avenue and Charles Street, and he has also erected a number of substantial business buildings in the city of Seattle, together with a number of dwellings. He is the owner of valuable timber lands in the state and has well selected realty in other towns and cities aside from those already mentioned. He has recently accumulated a tract of land on Beacon Hill, and this will be platted for residence purposed and is destined to become one of the most desirable sections of the city. Mr. Hemrich erected his own beautiful residence, one of the finest in the city, in 1901, the same being located on the southwest corner of Belmont Avenue and Republican Street. It is substantial and commodious, of effective architectural design, having the most modern equipments and accessories and is a home which would do credit to any metropolitan community.
While Mr. Hemrich takes an abiding interest in all that concerns the advancement and material upbuilding of his home city and state, he has never taken an active part in political affairs, maintaining an independent attitude in this regard and giving his support to men and measures. Fraternally he is a popular member of the Ancient Order of United Workmen and the Fraternal Order of Eagles, and he is most highly esteemed in both business and social circles. On the 20th of May, 1897, in the city of Seattle, Mr. Hemrich was united in marriage to Miss Eliza Hanna, daughter of Nicholas and Mary Hanna, who were numbered among the early settlers of this city, where Mrs. Hemrich was born and reared and where she has been prominent in the best social life.”

To that, Gary Flynn on Brewery Gems continued Hemrich’s story:

Less than a year after the article was published, Elizabeth, his wife of 10 years suddenly died. And on 2 May, 1910, his brother, Andrew, president of Seattle Brewing & Malting – succumbed to an illness and passed away. Louis then assumed his brother’s position as president of the company and continued to oversee its phenomenal growth. By 1914 the brewery was the largest west of the Mississippi and 6th largest in the world. Additionally, it was the largest industrial enterprise in the state of Washington. But this too was to pass.

But that’s just the beginning, read the rest at Gary Flynn’s Brewery Gems, who also concludes Hemrich’s story with this:

In July 1938, Louis Hemrich retired from active involvement, but remained on the Rainier Brewing Co. board of directors. A little over three years later, on 26 September 1941, Louis succumbed after battling a three month illness. He was survived by his spouse, Etta Maude, and two daughters.

Seattle_-_Hemrich_Bro's_Brewing_Co_-_1900
Hemrich Brothers Brewing around 1900.

Historic Beer Birthday: Edward F. Sweeney

May 10, 2025 By Jay Brooks

seattle-brewing-malting
Today is the birthday of Edward F. Sweeney (May 10, 1860-1923). Although born in San Francisco, Sweeney was involved with founding the Seattle Brewing & Malting Company, the makers of Rainier Beer, along with several other brewery and other businesses in the Seattle area.

Here’s a biography of Sweeney from “An Illustrated History of the State of Washington,” by Rev. H.K. Hines, published in 1893, as it appears on the Brewery Gems page for Sweeney, by Gary Flynn.

Edward F. Sweeney, Secretary of the Seattle Brewing & Malting Company, is a native son of the Golden West, born in San Francisco, California, May 10, 1860.
His father, Morgan Sweeney, was a California pioneer of 1850, who made mining the occupation of his life. He (Morgan) was married in California to Miss Mary Nunan¹, whose father was also a pioneer of the State.
Edward F. Sweeney was educated at St. Mary’s College in San Francisco. His business career began at the age of seventeen, in the French Savings Bank, but shortly after be entered the office of the brewery² of M. Nunan and remained two years. He then went to the Fredericksburg Brewery at San Jose and entered practically into the study of the brewery business. After becoming thoroughly conversant with all details of manufacture and with methods of conducting such an enterprise, he returned to San Francisco as superintendent of Mr. Nunan’s plant, which turned out about 30,000 barrels of beer per year.
In 1882-84 (depending on the account), he came to Seattle, and, forming a co-partnership with W. J. Rule, built a small brewery south of town for the manufacture of steam beer. The firm of Rule & Sweeney continued about eighteen months (sic), when Mr. Rule retired and Mr. Sweeney continued operations alone, gradually increasing the extent of his plant as the conditions of the trade demanded.
In 1888 he organized a stock company known as the Claussen-Sweeney Brewing Company, with a capital of $80,000. The brewery was then rebuilt, and with improved machinery they entered exclusively into the manufacture of lager beer, with an annual output of 36,000 barrels, which was sold throughout the Northwest. In May, 1891, Mr. Claussen³ sold his interest to Mr. George F. Gund⁴, and the business was continued up to the spring of 1893, when the company consolidated with the Bay View Brewing Company and the Albert Braun Brewing Company, incorporating as the Seattle Brewing & Malting Company; capital stock, $1,000,000. Mr. Sweeney was elected secretary of the new organization, whose plant has a capacity for an annual output of 150,000 barrels.
Mr. Sweeney is also a stockholder of the King County Bank; a director of the National Bank of Commerce; owns valuable real-estate interests in Seattle, and mining interests in the Cascade Mountains. Socially, he affiliates with the K. of P., B.P.O.E., the Seattle Athletic Club and the Seattle Yacht Club. He is also a member of the Chamber of Commerce, and is a member of the manufacturing committee of that institution.

Gary Flynn, Brewery Gems, points out that there are several discrepancies with that account and he tries to correct them and adds later details of Sweeney’s life.

And here’s another from “An Illustrated History of the State of Washington.”

And here’s an account of how the brewery came to be known as the Seattle Brewing & Malting Company from the “History of Seattle from the Earliest Settlement to the Present Time, Volume 2,” by Clarence Bagley

Historic Beer Birthday: William H. Biner

April 16, 2025 By Jay Brooks

east-idaho
Today is the birthday of William H. “Billy” Biner (April 16, 1889-January 5, 1953). Biner was a journeyman brewer who worked for numerous breweries over his long career. He was born in the Montana territory to Swiss immigrant parents. His father, Theophil Biner, knew Leopold Schmidt and even worked at his Olympia Brewery. Biner sent two of his sons, including Billy once he’s finished with a career as a boxer, to brewing school in Milwaukee. Biner’s first brewing job was at the Phoenix Brewery in Vancouver, British Columbia in 1912. He then worked as the brewmaster for at least eight more breweries, from Los Angeles to Canada. The breweries he worked at included the Mexicali Brewery; the Orange Crush Bottling Company in L.A.; the Mexicali Brewing Company again after it was rebuilt following an earthquake; then the Kootenay Breweries, Ltd. in both Nelson and Trail, in BC, Canada; followed by the Ellensburg Brewing Co. in Washington, and then in 1937 he founded his own brewery, the Mutual Brewing Company. But it didn’t last thanks to World War II and supply issues, and it folded. Afterward, he moved on to both Sicks’ Century Brewery in Seattle and the Silver Springs Brewery in Port Orchard, Washington. Finally, he ran the East Idaho Brewing Co. in Pocatello, Idaho until 1946, when he retired from brewing and bought his own bar, the Leipzig Tavern in Portland, Oregon. He stayed there until a year before he died, which was in 1953.

You can read his biography at Brewery Gems, written by Gary Flynn working with Joseph Fulton, the grandson of Billy Biner.

Beer Birthday: Dave Buhler

March 31, 2025 By Jay Brooks

Today is Dave Buhler’s 66th birthday. Interestingly, like Dick Cantwell, whose birthday was yesterday, Dave was also a co-founder of Elysian Brewing in Seattle, Washington. Join me in wishing Dave a very happy birthday.

d-buhler-1
Fal Allen and Dave Buhler at OBF.

d-buhler-2
Dave and Celebrator publisher Tom Dalldorf (at right). Neither Tom or I could identify the fellow in the middle, sorry about that. Can anybody help me out and tell me who that is?

bestowest09-25
At the Celebrator’s best of the West Beer Festival in 2009.

gabf06-thu-10
Dave with his former business partner and Elyisian co-founder Dick Cantwell at GABF in 2006.

Beer Birthday: Dick Cantwell

March 30, 2025 By Jay Brooks

Today is Dick Cantwell’s 67th birthday. He’s the former head brewer and co-founder of Elysian Brewing in Seattle, Washington. In addition to brewing, Dick’s a great writer, too, and his work frequently appears in numerous beer magazines. Cantwell’s the co-author of Barley Wine and Wood & Beer: A Brewer’s Guide, with Peter Bouckaert, formerly of New Belgium Brewing, and more recently Brewing Eclectic IPA. He was also on the BA’s board of directors and headed both the Communications and Pipeline committees and worked for a time as the BA’s Quality Ambassador. More recently, he was brewing with Magnolia in San Francisco, but he’s retired to a new home in my neck of the woods in Sonoma County and built his own garage brewery. Join me in wishing Dick a very happy birthday.

With Kim Jordan at the Firestone Walker Invitational in 2023.

With me, Vinnie Cilurzo, Jeremy Cowan and Natalie Cilurzo, at the Bistro Double IPA Festival in 2023.

At New Belgium’s airport taproom in Denver after GABF judging in 2022.

dick-c-1 — Award-winning Portland beer writer Lisa Morrison and Dick at an Elysian event during OBF.

ak-bw08-1 — Dick, with an English volunteer, and Sam Calagione, from Dogfish Head Brewing in Delaware, enjoying themselves at the Elysian Booth during the Alaska Barleywine Festival in 2008.

fr-fri-1 — Enjoying a pint at the Falling Rock in Denver with Portland Brewing co-founder Fred Bowman during GABF week.

Historic Beer Birthday: Albert Braun

February 27, 2025 By Jay Brooks

Today is the birthday of Albert Braun (February 27, 1863-February 27, 1895). He was born in Dusseldorf, Germany, and emigrated to the U.S. when he was 25, in 1888. He worked at several breweries, including Anheuser-Busch in St. Louis, before settling in Seattle in 1889. The following year he opened the Albert Braun Brewing Association. It was in business only un 1893, when it merged with several other local breweries to become part of the Seattle Brewing and Malting Company.

albert-braun-in-group-shot — The only photograph I could find of Braun is in the group shot, which in ran in a nostalgia piece in the newspaper, in 1934. Braun is apparently seated at the far left.

This biography is from “An Illustrated History of the State of Washington, by Rev. H.K. Hines, published in 1893:

ALBERT BRAUN, vice-president of the Seattle Brewing and Malting Company was born at Dusseldorf, on the Rhine, Germany, in February, 1863. He was educated in the schools of Germany and then traveled quite extensively through the European countries. His business career began under the direction of his father, who was an extensive manufacturer of preserved fruits, vegetables, meats and fancy canned goods, and was continued in the same industry, in partnership with his brother at Mainz, on the Rhine.
In 1888 Mr. Braun sold his interest and came to the United States and, upon the advice of Adolphus Busch, president of the Anheuser- Busch Association, of St. Louis, Missouri, he entered the brewery of Peter Doelger, of New York, and learned the practical workings of the business, completing his instruction in the details at the Anheuser-Busch brewery in St. Louis.
In 1889 Mr. Braun made a trip through the Northwest, and, after a short visit in Seattle, he was so favorably impressed with the people and location of the city that he decided upon the city as a location for future settlement. He then returned to St. Louis and continued his studies of the brewery business up to March 1, 1890, when he again visited Seattle and at once engaged in the organization of the Albert Braun Brewing Association, which was incorporated with a capital of $250,000, he being duly elected president and general manager. The brewery was erected six miles south of Seattle, very complete in all its appointments, with a capacity of 70,000 barrels per year, the Product finding a ready market in Washington, region, Idaho and British Columbia. Continuing up to 1893, the Albert Braun Brewing Association was consolidated with the Bay View Brewing Company and the Claussen-Sweeney Brewing Company, and incorporated as the Seattle Brewing and Malting Company, with capital stock of $1,000,000. The affairs of the new association were conducted by the managers of the old breweries, the official corps being: Andrew Hemrich, President; Albert Braun, Vice-President; Edward F. Sweeney, Secretary; and Fred Kirschner, Treasurer.
The company expects to develop brewing and malting into one of the leading interests of the city of Seattle, and as their product has competed successfully with the best Eastern brands there is little doubt of an auspicious future.
Mr. Braun is also interested in various other enterprises of the city and he has perfect faith and confidence in the future of Seattle and the Sound districts.

According to Brewing in Seattle, by Kurt Stream, Braun was named Vice-President of Seattle Brewing and Malting. Here’s how it went down:

The Seattle Times also has a story about what happened to Braun’s brewery:

ALBERT BRAUN arrived from Iowa soon after Seattle’s Great Fire of 1889. Within a year and a half, the young German immigrant, with financial help from local and Midwestern investors, built a brewery about 2 miles south of Georgetown.
The serpentine Duwamish River is hidden behind the brewery. Directly across the river, on its west side and also hidden, was the neighboring community of South Park. Braun’s name is emblazoned on the brewery’s east facade, and so it was best read from the ridge of Beacon Hill and from the trains on the railway tracks below.
The brewing began here December 1890, and the brewery’s primary brands, Braun’s Beer, Columbia Beer and Standard Beer, reached their markets in March 1891. The 1893 Sanborn fire insurance map for Seattle includes a footprint of the plant that is faithful to this undated photograph. The map’s legend notes that the buildings were “substantial, painted in and outside” with “electric lights and lanterns” and that a “watchman lives on the premises.” It also reveals, surprisingly, that the brewery was “not in operation” since July of that year. What happened?
The economic panic of 1893 closed many businesses and inspired a few partnerships, too. Braun’s principal shareholders partnered his plant with two other big beer producers, the Claussen Sweeney and Bay Views breweries, to form the Seattle Brewing and Malting Co. Braun’s landmark was then designated “Albert Braun’s Branch.”
Of the three partnering breweries, this was the most remote, and it was largely for that reason, it seems, that it was soon closed. The upset Braun soon resigned; sold most of his interest in the partnership; and relocated to Rock Island, Ill. There, he started work on a new brewery and fell in love, but with tragic results: Early in 1895, Braun committed suicide, reportedly “over a love affair.”
For six years after its closing, the tidy Braun brewery beside the Duwamish River stood like a museum to brewing, but without tours. Practically all the machinery was intact, from its kettles to its ice plant, until the early morning of Sept. 30, 1899. On that day, The Seattle Times reported, “the nighthawks who were just making their way home and the milkmen, butchers and other early risers were certain that the City of Tacoma was surely being burned down.” They were mistaken. It was Braun’s brewery that was reduced to smoldering embers. The plant’s watchman had failed that night to engage the sprinkler system connected to the tank at the top of the five-story brewery.
There is at least a hint that the brewery grounds were put to good use following the fire. The Times, on Aug. 11, 1900, reported that the teachers of the South Park Methodist Episcopalian Sunday school took their classes “out for a holiday on the banks of the beautiful Duwamish River, (and for) a pleasant ride over the river to the Albert Braun picnic grounds.”

Gary Flynn filled in the gaps about what happened to Flynn after 1893, on his page on Braun at his website Brewery Gems:

Albert Braun took his own life, with a gun shot to the heart, on February 27, 1895, at the young age of 32. While still holding a significant number of Seattle Brewing & Malting Co. shares, he was not considered well-to-do in the matter of ready cash. Additionally, Braun had left Seattle for Illinois, after millionair brewer, Otto Huber, indicated that he was interested in partnering with Braun in the purchase of the LaSalle Brewing Co. For what ever reason Huber went back on his promise, leaving Braun with no immediate prospects and in a state of despair.

He has more about the Albert Braun Brewery, too.

Historic Beer Birthday: John Weidenfeller

February 11, 2025 By Jay Brooks

grand-rapids
Today is the birthday of John Weidenfeller (February 11, 1867-1929). He was born in Germany, but came to America with his family, who settled in Michigan and owned a farm. Weidenfeller though, defying his father’s wishes, became a brewer, working first with “Frey Bros. and Kusterer Brewing Companies. In 1892, these two breweries joined three others to form the Grand Rapids Brewing Co.” He later worked in Montana for the Centennial Brewery, before accepting a position as brewmaster of Olympia Brewing in Washington.

There’s also a photograph of Weidenfeller that can be seen at Brewery Gems’ biography of John Weidenfeller shared with him by the brewer’s family.

There’s less about brewmasters, as opposed to brewers who were also brewery founders or owners, when you go back this far, but there’s a pretty thorough biography of Weidenfeller by Gary Flynn at his website Brewery Gems.

Weidenfeller around 1901, with his workers in Montana.

Beer Birthday: Ralph Olson

January 26, 2025 By Jay Brooks

hop-blooded
Today is Ralph Olson’s 74th birthday. Ralph was the general manager/co-owner of HopUnion, a co-op that supplied hops to many of the craft breweries. Ralph is retired but for awhile I’d still see him at occasional beer events throughout the country, but not as much lately. He’s been a good friend to and very supportive of the craft beer industry. Join me in wishing Ralph a very happy birthday.

cbc07-05
Ralph Olson, the Big Cheese from HopUnion. If you look carefully in between his “Sponsor” and “Exhibitor” badge you can see his title really is officially “the Big Cheese.

gabf07-05
Ralph and me at the end of the brewer’s reception at GABF in 2007.

gabf07-58
Dave Keene, from the Toronado, Dave Pyle, Ralph and Becky Pyle, who are also with HopUnion, along with my friend Dave Suurballe.

ralph-olson-3
Ralph sandwiched between Jessica, the former event coordinator for the AOB and Chad Kennedy, brewer at Laurelwood Public House & Brewery in Portland, Oregon at GABF in 2006.

ralph-olson-4
With Natalie Cilurzo of Russian River Brewing, who’s accepting an award at the Alpha King Hop Challenge in 2006. If you look closely, you can find the award money.

ralph-olson-1
Ralph with the other HopUnion Ralph, Ralph Woodall, and Rob Widmer, the younger half of Widmer Brothers Brewing, at the 15th Anniversary Party for the Celebrator Beer News.

Historic Beer Birthday: Leopold Schmidt

January 23, 2025 By Jay Brooks

Today is the birthday of Leopold F. Schmidt (January 23, 1846-September 24, 1914) who founded the Olympia Brewing Co. in Tumwater, Washington in 1896. Although it was originally called the Capital Brewing Company, but changed it in 1902 to reflect its flagship Olympia Beer, and also began using the slogan “It’s the Water.”

Gary Flynn from Brewery Gems has the best biography of Schmidt. He also has a shorter piece about Schmidt’s first brewery in Montana, the Centennial Brewing Co., which he sold in 1896, before moving to Washington to scout locations for his next venture. He settled on Tumwater, and built a brewery “at Tumwater Falls on the Deschutes River, near the south end of Puget Sound. He built a four-story wooden brewhouse, a five-story cellar building, a one-story ice factory powered by the lower falls, and a bottling and keg plant and in 1896, began brewing and selling Olympia Beer.”

The Olympia Tumwater Foundation picks up Schmidt’s story through his home, the Schmidt House:

The Schmidt House, set high on a wooded bluff at the mouth of the Deschutes River, was built at the turn of the 20th Century for local brewery owner Leopold Schmidt and his wife Johanna. Mr. Schmidt already owned a successful brewing operation in Montana when a business trip first brought him to the Tumwater area in the early 1890s. Discovering that the artesian springs here were perfect for brewing beer, Schmidt sold his Montana holdings and built a new brewery at the foot of Tumwater Falls which shipped its first beer in 1896.
At first the Schmidt’s moved into an existing house on the slope above the brewery, a home that the family affectionately nicknamed “Hillside Inn.” As his brewing business prospered, Mr. Schmidt began planning a larger, more elegant residence that would stand at the top of the hill. In 1904 the couple moved into the new house with their daughter, the youngest of six children. Their five sons continued to live at Hillside Inn and work in the family business. For reasons lost to posterity, the Schmidt’s called the new house “Three Meter.”

Leopold and his wife Johanna, posing with their six children in a portrait taken in the late 1890s.

Here’s more on Olympia, again from Flynn:

In October 1896, after issuing $125,000 in capital stock, he established the Capital Brewing Company, nucleus of what would become the highly successful Olympia Brewing Company. The brewery was an unqualified success, its product outselling competing beers from Seattle and Tacoma. The pure artesian water and Schmidt’s brewing skills were a perfect match. The enterprise steadily grew in production in the following years, reaching peak production of 100,000 barrels of beer in 1914, just in time for statewide prohibition. This not only shut down the Olympia plant but also the other two plants in the state, the Bellingham Bay Brewery and the Port Townsend Brewery. Oregon also voted to go “dry” in 1914, five years before national prohibition, which ended the Salem Brewery Association. Only the two Acme Brewery plants in San Francisco were spared, albeit temporarily.

After prohibition was repealed, Leopold’s son Peter Schmidt ordered the construction of larger brewery buildings upriver from the 1906 building, rather than repurchasing and retrofitting the aging structure.

There’s quite a lot on the history of Olympia Brewing, and here are a few good sources. The Cooperpoint Journal has Water to Beer: A Timeline of Industry and Drinking and the Seattle Weekly wrote Olympia Beer: The Water and the History. But Brewery Gems again has a thorough History of the Olympia Brewing Company, and the Olympia Tumwater Foundation had a concise history. Even cooler, the Foundation has some great old photos online, in Images of the Old Brewhouse : A Pictorial Exhibit from the Archives of the Olympia Tumwater Foundation.

The brewery around 1900, a few years before I first visited it on my honeymoon.

Leopold posing on his lawn overlooking the brewery in the early 1900s.

And here is a portion of Schmidt’s obituary in the Tacoma Daily Register from September 25, 1914:

And this obituary is from the Bellingham Herald:

Historic Beer Birthday: Matt Bonney

January 5, 2025 By Jay Brooks

Today would have been the 51st birthday of Matt Bonney, formerly of Brouwer’s and Bottleworks, both in Seattle, Washington, and later the proprietor of Toronado Seattle. Bonney was one of my favorite people in the industry. You would have been be hard-pressed to find a person more passionate about good beer. He also knew how to throw a party and was always a gracious host. Unfortunately, he unexpectedly passed away in late March of 2019. Join me in drinking a toast to Bonney tonight. He is definitely missed.

publication-13
Matt with Chris Black, from Falling Rock Taphouse in Denver, pouring candy sugar to create Publication at Russian River Brewing in May of 2008.

hard-liver09-06
Matt (3rd from left) with the final judges at the 2009 Hard Liver Barleywine Festival at Brouwer’s.

anoa-06
Matt with Dave Keene, from the Toronado, at the A Night of Ales beer dinner during SF Beer Week.

slofn08-05
Dr. Bill with Matt at Slow Food Nation 2008.

« Previous Page