“I don’t drink beer cause it doesn’t make me feel well, and I need every brain cell I’ve been given. And I don’t drink beer, I don’t mean to be overcautious, but the bitter taste makes me nauseous. I don’t drink beer.” From I Don’t Drink Beer, written by Tim Hawkins.
Just as the song above suggests, I do not drink beer… pretty much for the reasons Tim Hawkins noted. Besides, I’ve got low blood pressure and the one time I got drunk I just sat glowering in the corner and frightening the hell out of my friends. I was sixteen at that time, and that’s one of the few life lessons I’ve kept rattling around in my brainpan for the past six decades. However, like most everything that the Swells had deemed low-class, I fully appreciate beer culture.
Back in my sainted hometown of Chicago, just 90 miles south from the town that Schlitz thinks it made famous, the brewer built fifty “tied-houses” between 1897 and 1905 — saloons that sold only Schlitz beer — throughout the Midwest. The architecture was such that a large Schlitz logo was built into the motif and were decorated in colored terracotta. 10 such tied-houses remain in Chicago to this day, and on this day, not a one is serving Schlitz at all.
Granted, most haven’t served beer in years, but those that are still selling suds aren’t serving the beer that made Milwaukee famous. Schlitz went blooie this past weekend.
The Schlitz company itself kicked the beer-bucket a while ago. It passed through various hands and its final owner, Blatz (a brewery whose product, I am told, tastes just like it sounds) pulled the plug on Saturday. The last kegs weren’t even brewed in Milwaukee, although it was milked in the nearby town of Madison. That’s the Wisconsin state capitol, so I assume it was put to good use.
Beer has been an essential part of our global heritage pretty much since the dawn of recorded history. Don’t use that as an excuse to skip your next AA meeting — back then, beer was consumed because it was a lot more safe than the water that was available. H2O is a necessary part of our diet but it is preferred without the addition of fecal bacteria and other such toxins that take the hop out of hops.
My pal John Ostrander used to brew his own, and he really knew his stuff. He also was a beer connoisseur. I’m ecstatic to say John’s still with us, but his subsequent activities have led him on a different path. More recently, but not at all recent, the Chicago Tribune took my daughter Adriane, Joe and Hilarie Staton, and me to a very nice lunch in gratitude for our work on one of their Dick Tracy reprint books. Joe is another one of those beer connoisseurs, as is Adriane. They each ordered a flight of five different types and then proceeded to have a taste-test. They sampled all ten beers and shared their reviews with the table. I don’t recall which was deemed best, although I doubt either Schlitz or Blatz were part of their chosen elite. My major recollection is that I was glad our convention hotel wasn’t far away.
Along with bread, potato chips and candy, local beers were part of the charm of each city. I’m not talking about the elite craft beers that were quite a fad and remain an expensive alternative to the Busch family product. I’m talking about beers that were available at any of your local neighborhood taverns and package stores. In the Midwest, we had suds with exotic names like Drewrys, Meister Brau, Atlas Prager, and Hamm’s.
That latter brewer employed a cartoon spokesanimal who was a bear. Get it? Beer / Bear? And he was naked, too. The bare bear bear sponsored a lot of Cubs games, which probably helped us Cubs fans more than the money helped the Wrigley family. Hamm’s is even older than Schlitz and still is being brewed — now by Coors, which, in turn, is owned by Molson. Just a couple years ago eleven bucks would get you thirty cans of Hamm’s.
I find it odd that, soon people are going to stare at those magnificent Schlitz tied-houses and wonder what the hell they were for — assuming they look up from their smartphones and call up their long-buried sense of wonder.
Reality is even weirder than artificial intelligence.
