Previously: 40 Years in Beer (Book II), Part 70: Made-for-megabrewing stylelessness at the G.A.B.F. in 1997.
Quite apart from the attractions built into the Great American Beer Festival during the late 1990s came the opportunity to explore downtown Denver CO, which boasted many more breweries than the entire, extended region of “Kentuckiana” (or is it Indyucky?)
Such a concentration of breweries within relatively easy walking distance of each other had not beckoned to me since the Bamberg trip in 1996 — and I’m forever in favor of drinking beer and NOT driving.
The Denver breweries were clustered around Lower Downtown (LoDo) and Coors Field, and in 1998 our hardy band of samplers quickly improvised a “drink a pint and keep moving” game plan, which included the non-brewing but magnificent beer bar called the Falling Rock Taphouse.
Pints Pub was the geographical exception, situated 1.5 miles from LoDo near the state governmental complex, so we used the free public transit connector via 16th St. for access to its lovely cask-conditioned, British-style ales.
In chronological order, commencing one day just before lunch, these establishments were sampled. Can I recall details? No, not really, apart from there being far fewer IPAs on tap than malt-forward styles, which suited me fine and still does.
- Great Divide Brewing Co. (1994 – )
- Breckinridge Brewery (1992 – )
- Broadway Brewing (Flying Dog; 1994 – 2007)
- SandLot Brewery (Coors Field; 1995 – )
- Denver Chophouse & Brewery (1995 – )
- Wynkoop Brewing Co. (1988 – )
- Dixon Downtown Grill and Brewhouse (1997 – 2011)
- Champion Brewing Co. (1991 – 2000)
- Pints Pub (1993 – )
- Falling Rock Taphouse (1997 – 2021)
I find it increasingly hard to delineate between the GABF in 1997 and 1998, apart from Bluegrass Brewing Co. winning a medal for Bearded Pat’s Barley Wine both years (1). The expensive, ambitious and short-lived BrewWorks at the Party Source (Covington, Kentucky) and its talented brewer Tim Rastetter captured medals for all five of its entries in 1997, and our dear friend and brewer Ron Downer of the long-shuttered Rocky River Brewing Co. in Sevierville, Tennessee medaled in 1998.

Beyond these it’s a blur, albeit pleasing.
In 1998 those in attendance and our choice of hotels differed, and it seems we spent less time at the G.A.B.F. itself, preferring to carouse at the aforementioned breweries. The autumn weather was wonderful both years, and much time was spent strolling downtown, of course allowing for the first day’s altitude-enforced adjustments.
All of it came pleasingly together as an encouraging reminder: Beer in America might, in fact, be great again. But could we keep Anheuser-Busch’s poisonous tentacles from choking our collective buzz? Never had the Great A-Brewing Satan seemed as malevolent as in 1997 and 1998.
—
Consequently, the 1997 and 1998 editions of the G.A.B.F. produced bountiful ideological insights pertaining to pre-merger A-B, which remained America’s largest brewing company. Nuggets like these were too good to ignore for an eager polemicist like me, and the subsequent cage-rattling was effective in the sense that the more self-important the stuffed shirt A-B functionary, the thinner his or her skin.
Indeed, those people were often spotted bloviating red-faced, and such sightings invariably were hilarious.
To deploy a sports analogy, A-B’s headlining “free agent” acquisition at the time was Mitch Steele, a graduate of the University of California-Davis with a degree in fermentation science, who began his career at the obscure San Andreas Brewing Company in Hollister, California.
During Steele’s tenure at A-B from 1992 through 2006, he was involved with the development of A-B’s emerging “mockrobrew” product lines (among others, the brief American Originals experiment, and the longer-lived Michelob brand extensions) and worked as a plant manager at the monolith’s regional breweries in Colorado and New Hampshire.
Compared with A-B’s customarily humorless, arrogant bureaucrats, the hip and youthful Steele had the aura of a rising rock star. He was born on December 31, 1961 (I’m older by only 16 months) and had at least experienced the “craft beer” ethos at the grassroots. Was it realistic to think Steele himself might elevate A-B’s game?
By 2006, the question had become moot, and that’s when Steele jumped to the ascendant Stone Brewing Co., prior to launching his own New Realm Brewing (Atlanta, Georgia) in 2016. Turns out he was a rock star, just not at A-B.
At some point in the future, Mitch Steele surely will be nominated to become a member of the American Craft Beer Hall of Fame, a nomination I’d happily make, and a selection I heartily endorse. Steele’s A-B tenure is largely forgotten, and in truth, very little of his career trajectory would be noteworthy in other fields of professional endeavor, where education is followed by entry-level experience, then steady advancement, perhaps later bringing the chance to strike out and form one’s own company.
However, as I will continue to argue, what came to be known as “craft” beer always has been accompanied by an ideological component that isn’t applicable to “business as usual.” Viewed through this lens, Steele’s perfectly routine pro brewer’s path became the occasion for questions like these to be asked (by me; his answers will appear in the next installment).
- Was it always your desire to work for the biggest of the big boys? Do you consider your current position to represent the top of your profession?
- How did it feel to be treated with silence by the crowd at the (1997) GABF awards ceremony?
- Was my experience with American Originals (failing to sell) unique? Isn’t it true that when the bulk of the A-B marketing machinery continues to reinforce the notion that Budweiser is the epitome of man’s sensual pleasure on planet earth, that this weight of propaganda renders moot any effort that your specialty division might make to suggest otherwise?
- Is it an accurate assessment of Anheuser-Busch’s motives to suggest that its mockrobrews are intended to seize shelf space and eliminate pesky competitors?
- Why don’t you believe in beer?
The final query is a shade embarrassing. In 1997, I delightedly created a straw man out of Mitch Steele and went straight at it with polemical fangs bared, as if his employment at A-B singlehandedly threatened the vitality of the whole microbrewing revolution.
And yet Steele shrugged off the venom, fielded my questions with aplomb, and a year after we first met, came to Louisville and attended a FOSSILS meeting in New Albany to address people who were purchasing quite little of his employer’s everyday beer. Steele actually had nuances, and since we didn’t know each other at all, why wouldn’t I miss them?
To be sure, personal definitions of success in the context of professional attainment began to vary during the microbrewing era. Recall what Frank Sinatra sang about New York – “if I can make it there, I’ll make it anywhere” – and consider that for a professional brewer during the 1980s and 1990s, A-B might as well have been the Big Apple incarnate.
It was “top of the heap” professionally for anyone keen to pay off those pesky student loans at the logical junction of education and training. It makes perfect sense, and even better for our side of the aisle, eventually Steele took his considerable skills to “craft.”
He succeeded there, too.
Teaching moments forever abound, and this “40 Years” narrative already has revealed a balance sheet comprised of the many things Roger got right, and the many other things he got wrong.
Considering what Steele later accomplished at both Stone and New Realm, there can be no doubt whatever that I misread him completely in 1997, even while my assessment of A-B’s early efforts at co-opting the better beer revolution, by turns ham-fisted and purely malicious, was largely correct, persisting to the present day.
Judge for yourselves, because here again is a complete Walking the Dog text from early 1998, once again centered on the eventful 1997 G.A.B.F.
Also, this is the song by the late, great Mojo Nixon, who died in 2024, that provided the opening motif for the article: “Elvis Is Everywhere.”
—
A-B Is Still the King
A-B Is Everywhere.
A-B Is Everything.
A-B Is Everybody.
A-B Is Still the King.
Stroking the 800-lb. Gorilla at a Small Gathering of Beer Lovers in Denver.
“And so, umm, Roger – I see you’re from Louisville – what do you think about Anheuser-Busch being here at the Great American Beer Festival?”
Looking on as the interview unfolded, a middle-aged man standing behind a table crowded with sleek pitchers of A-B’s vaunted new mockrobrews rolled his eyes and smiled patronizingly at me. He’d been well trained to counter mischief makers like me; by turns loftily condescending and coolly dispassionate, and patiently repeating simplistic stock phrases over and over in the hope of winning the battle of attrition.
Fortunately, quick reconnaissance revealed the A-B party line wasn’t airtight. An A-B employee standing next to me had started to lose her temper about the time the film crew spotted me and began positioning the boom overhead in the hope of catching a juicy, dissenting soundbite – which I was more than happy to provide.
“Well…”
The microphone almost brushed the woman’s hair as it wobbled in my direction.
“I think that Anheuser-Busch being invited to the Great American Beer Festival is like Joseph Goebbels giving the keynote speech to a gathering of Holocaust survivors.”
The man in command behind the table began to compose his face into puppyish hurt, no doubt to scold me for being such a bad little boy, but Miss Budweiser abruptly erupted, thick slabs of makeup cracking in spidery facial contortions.
“That’s horrible,” she said. “I’d like you to know that what you just said is deeply offensive to me and to all the employees of Anheuser-Busch…”
“Yeah, right,” I sneered in return, “and what your company has done to the essence of beer as beer was meant to be is fairly offensive to me, too. You know, castration is a very, very ugly thing.”
Now the older man was grimacing as he watched his efforts to maintain order begin to dissolve. The woman’s voice continued to rise, and looking sideways, I saw some of the younger A-B goons in their designer polo shirts nervously twitching, as though waiting for instructions from the hovering Busch Copter.
MAYDAY MAYDAY … this is Three Sticks. Take him out … now! Make it clean – do you read me? Now! This is Three Sticks…” (2)
What a Marvelous Time for a Fantasy Dream Sequence.
We return to the Red Wolf’s Lair, One Busch Plaza, St. Looey. Members of the press crowd around the podium.
“Stone Phillips, NBC News. Mr. Busch, is…”
“Say, you’re the one we hired for that Dateline hatchet job … I mean, report … about Sam Adams, aren’t you?” (3)
“Yes sir, Mr. Busch. My colleague Chris Hansen rode point.”
“That was a fine piece of investigative journalism, son.”
“Thank you, Mr. Busch. As television stars in the 1990s, our highest journalistic priority remains the appeasement of free-spending corporate advertising clients.”
“Thank you, Phillips. We appreciate your trade.”
“Here’s my question, Mr. Busch, and it’s an easy one, sir. Can you tell us what happened to that rude man at the G.A.B.F. who insulted your family’s heritage of selfless public service and patriotism?”
“That guy? Well, our rigorous quality control team — it’s the best in the beer biz, you know — did a background check on Mr. Baker…”
“Baylor, sir.”
“Right, Baylor; whatever. Our crackerjack quality control guys did an on-the-spot background check and scanned Baylor’s UPC while he was standing there, mouthing off. It indicated that his relevance date had passed. His time expired. We simply took him off the shelf.”
“So, Mr. Busch, it was all just a routine procedure that confirms your company’s commitment to freshness?”
“Exactly. Now let me introduce someone to the press corps here. Step on up here, Mitch. This is Mitch Steele, our specialty group brewmaster, who we hired away from some little piece of shit microbrewery out west, and now he’s the brewer and spokesman for our new line of specialty mockrobrews. Mitch, could you tell us about our newest American Original?”
“Sure, Mr. Busch. I’m here to tell you about our new Anheuser-Busch mockrobrews, formulated with the expertise I gained by working in a micro in California, back before I quit and moved up to the world’s biggest and best brewery — thanks for the opportunity, Mr. Busch — and the latest release is called Benedict Arnold’s Nut ‘n’ Honey Turncoat Rice Paddy Ale.
“Check out the cool label, everyone. You know, classy printing like that doesn’t come cheap, and to prove it, we’re backing this mockrobrew’s rollout with a $59 million campaign that should have every American hearing or seeing the words ‘Benedict Arnold’ ten times a day…available in cans, bottles and convenient 1/6th barrel kegs…with all our fine distributors nationwide backing it with 100% of their efforts … ”
“But Mr. Steele, can’t you tell us something about the beer itself?”
“Uh, yes, I suppose so. After all, that’s why I’m here. Isn’t it, Mr. Busch? Mr. Busch…where did he go?”
Opening Lt. Colombo’s Seedy Raincoat.
Know that Mitch Steele really is a brewmaster, and he really does work for Anheuser-Busch’s Specialty Brewing Group. He really does formulate mockrobrews. When he came to the stage during the G.A.B.F. awards ceremony to accept A-B’s three medals (4), the otherwise demonstrative and festive crowd became totally silent. There were no catcalls, no boos; just nothingness, although derision might be inferred.
I caught up with Mitch Steele at the Saturday afternoon session of the GABF. Would he consent to a hostile interview via e-mail? Yes, absolutely. Later, back home, I e-mailed Steele to remind him of his promise. He replied, “Send your questions anytime and, as I promised, I’ll do my best to answer them. I’m curious to know how/why you feel the way you do regarding A-B. Perhaps your questions will tell me.”
Fowst? Who the Hell Is That?
Back from Denver, the memory of A-B’s medaled mockrobrews fresh and clear, I donned my Publican’s hat and sat down to analyze the results of my latest grand experiment in plumbing the depths of the dysfunctional consumer psychology that reigns in America’s mass market culture of swill, not coincidentally, the same culture of swill that has evolved from several decades of saturation advertising and marketing hype advanced by the likes of Anheuser-Busch and its megabrewing brethren.
Specifically, in late summer I’d ordered four kegs of Faust Golden Lager from Nadorff Beverage, New Albany’s official wholesale purveyor of Anheuser-Busch products. Faust is one of Steele’s specialty beers, purportedly deriving its name from a turn of the century golden lager contract-brewed by Anheuser-Busch for Tony Faust, a St. Louis restaurateur.

My plan was simple: Remove regular Budweiser from its place on the draft station at Sportstime Pizza, replace it with Faust, and sell it to the Budweiser drinkers as something very special, for a brief time only: a genuine Anheuser-Busch beer available nowhere else in the entire state of Indiana except right here in New Albany at Sportstime Pizza. As a final selling point, in spite of Faust’s higher wholesale price, set above Budweiser but below genuine microbrews, the cost of a glass of Faust would be kept the same as regular Budweiser.
Come and get some!
To an educated and enlightened individual, particularly one who has undertaken beer literacy, such an offer would seem to be enticing. One could choose a better grade of golden lager beer, brewed by an accepted and well known megabrewer, pay the regular price for it, and revel in its exclusivity.
As for Faust itself, I tasted it at the beginning and determined that surprisingly, it was far more interesting than Budweiser, akin perhaps to European lagers in places like Luxembourg or Poland, or to the better efforts of the old U.S. regionals, like Hudepohl-Schoenling’s 1980s Christian Moerlein used to be.
Importantly, Faust displayed little, if any, trace of the familiar house character of other A-B brands. Given this fact, Faust was calculated to appeal to my “microbrew” crowd, too, and the omens for the experiment seemed favorable.
Is this enough foreshadowing for you?
Of course my Faust trial balloon was a miserable, catastrophic failure. Sales of draft Miller Lite and bottled Budweiser skyrocketed, as most of the regular Budweiser drinkers refused to even taste free samples of the new beer, even when painstakingly assured that it was not a micro, an import, or anything else that would violate their sacred pact to conform to the rutted, beaten path.
Public House customers concurred on different grounds, demurring loudly when it came to anything emanating from A-B. I’d trained them well, it seems.
Our employees were excellent, patiently describing Faust to successive, disinterested patrons, and with predictable results: Two kegs of the Faust languished on draft for more than a month, and when I called to order the third, I was informed that the remaining two kegs had pole-vaulted their shelf life. Like the poor soul (me again) in Denver who dared to question the gospel according to St. Busch, they had been returned to the planet’s water table from whence they came.
So, what did I learn from this experience?
For one, no support for this highly touted A-B mockrobrew was forthcoming from my otherwise efficient local Budweiser distributor. No point of sale materials were provided; these bright little cards and displays, for better or worse, are essential when dealing with the general drinking public, who generally are resistant to the dissemination of real knowledge, and prefer instead to gaze upon an athlete, a bimbo or some variety of cuddly reptile when calculating their purchases.
Lacking these crucial icons of late 20th-century beer marketing, I found that my efforts to educate (for instance, to explain the German beer purity law) were met with the blankest looks of helplessness and incomprehension that I’ve witnessed since calculus class in high school, when those looks were mine, and which were followed by desperate requests for ice-cold Budweiser in long-necked bottles, and the plaintive, mournful laments of “but Roger, when’s the draft Bud comin’ back?”
Note to Our Hitherto Loyal Distributors: “Vee Haff Vays Off Makink U Zell Herr Busch’s Bier.”
While in Denver, the irrepressible John Dennis and I ventured out to a small coffee shop on the 16th Street pedestrian mall and passed a few blissful hours reading the local newspapers and chatting about life over espresso and snacks. One news item stayed with me all morning. I thought about it again as a group of us passed Anheuser-Busch’s mobile “beer school,” which was parked across the street from Currigan Hall, site of the GABF.
“Quick,” I said to my guys. “Let’s play word association.”
There was mumbled agreement.
“Okay, I’ll say a phrase, and you tell me what immediately comes into your mind. Ready?”
“Go ahead.”
“Okay, here goes. Anheuser-Busch’s Beer School.”
“Swill,” said Matt Gould.
“Contradiction in terms,” said Kevin Richards.
“Excellent choices,” I responded.
“But what about you, Rog? What do you think of when you hear the words Anheuser-Busch Beer School?”
“That’s easy,” I said. “Two words. Molotov cocktail.”
We entered the hall, and I made a beeline for A-B’s Specialty Brewing Group booth. There, working on autopilot, extolling the party line as well as any political functionary in any corrupt and bloated regime that ever existed, was the same poker-faced gentleman who I’d spoken to earlier in the presence of the television cameras.
“Hi,” I said. “Remember me?”
“Sure,” he replied, “you’re…Roger.”
“Boy, we had a good discussion the other night, huh?”
“Oh, yes. It definitely was a good one. Lots of give and take.”
“Indeed. Well, I came back to ask you another question.”
“Go ahead. I’ll see if I can answer.”
“Okay. I remember that you guys told me how I misunderstand Anheuser-Busch, and all that.”
“That’s right. You don’t really know what we’re all about.”
“Maybe not. So tell me, what am I to make about the article in this morning’s paper?”
“What article?”
“The one about how the Department of Justice is investigating A-B’s strong-arm tactics with regard to its distributors.”
“Hmm. Haven’t heard about that one.” His eyes shifted skyward to study the architecture of Currigan Hall’s modernistic rafters.
“I see. That’d be the United States Department of Justice, looking into unfair business practices by A-B everywhere in the United States — not just here and there, but everywhere.”
“No, I can’t say as I know anything about that.”
“Gee, go figure. Maybe I dreamed the whole thing.”
“Could be. Have a nice festival, Roger.”
Naturally, I knew what I was talking about, and just as certainly, he knew what I was talking about, but perhaps my readers don’t know. Here’s what the newspaper article said, paraphrased courtesy of the “Beer Week” news service of the Real Beer Page:
A-B DISTRIBUTION PRACTICES UNDER INVESTIGATION BY DOJ (1997)
Anheuser-Busch, the world’s largest brewery, is reported to be under investigation by the U.S. Department of Justice for alleged violations of trade practices in distribution contracts with their wholesalers, according to an Associated Press report. The story, which was first reported by the Wall Street Journal, states that A-B has confirmed the investigation by the DOJ into its distribution practices. There have been allegations that the industry giant is trying to muscle smaller breweries off the market.
In response to the allegations, an A-B spokesman stated that “We are confident that all our practices are entirely legitimate and legal,” the AP story reported. Several lawsuits (previously reported in BeerWeek) have been brought against A-B by microbrewers in California over pressure exerted on distributors to only carry A-B products as part of their “100% Share of Mind” edict.
The WSJ report stated that DOJ investigators are looking into a restrictive wholesale distribution contract that A-B had its distributors sign in August which reportedly gave the brewing giant a say in practically all of the distributor’s ownership and management changes. A-B has denied assertions that it forces wholesalers to distribute only A-B products.
It’s all quite simple, isn’t it? If Anheuser-Busch distributors carry only A-B beers, thus forsaking the fast-growing specialty segment of the market, then they’ll have only one choice if they wish to have any semblance of a presence in that market.
You guessed it: It’d be Mitch Steele’s mockrobrews, like Faust, American Hop Ale, the Michelob specialty line, and even Amber O’Doul’s. Having eliminated at least some of the pesky competition up front, A-B would be free to seize even more local shelf space under the guise of helpful shelf space managers.
Why Not Just Nuke Them and Get It Over With? Whaddya Say, Auggie?
The pub’s phone rang. Someone else answered it, and pushed the receiver to me.
“It’s some woman.”
(Isn’t it always?)
She identified herself as an employee of Fleishman-Hillard, a St. Louis public relations firm that works for Anheuser-Busch.
“We understand that you have a question about Anheuser-Busch in the Czech Republic,” she began.
“Yes, indeed,” I said. “But that was six months ago.”
I proceeded to make an astute observation about freshness dating in the public relations industry, and in spite of this, she promised to e-mail me an official statement on the demise of the St. Louis Cultural Center in Ceske Budejovice, which I discussed in these pages earlier this year. (5)
In short, I had e-mailed Anheuser-Busch’s web page in April to ask why the company has closed the cultural center, which was a celebration of American mass-market consumerism and similar jingoistic propaganda, and how the center’s closure jibed with A-B’s incessant expressions of selfless love for the people of the Czech Republic — a love that transcended any crass commercial considerations with regard to A-B’s ability to negotiate a settlement of their trademark dispute with Budweiser Budvar, the Czech brewer.
Not unexpectedly, I heard nothing back. Noting this lapse, I again e-mailed A-B’s web page and asked them if I could expect a response some time before the millennium. This time, I got a more prompt response:
In 1992, Anheuser-Busch formed the St. Louis Center and later purchased and completely renovated a vacant property in Ceske Budejovice that became the permanent site of the St. Louis Center in 1994.
The Center provided numerous educational programs for local residents, including English classes, access to computer-based learning and support for the local Junior Achievement chapter. The Center and its programs also helped introduce our company to the local people. This type of community involvement is consistent with our company history and philosophy of contributing to the local communities in which we do business.
Discussions between Anheuser-Busch, the Budvar Brewery and the Czech Government regarding a trademark settlement over the use of the Budweiser name or a strategic alliance have ceased. Therefore, we see no opportunity to develop our business in the Czech Republic at this time. As a result, we closed the St. Louis Center in December 1996 in order to devote these community development resources to cities and countries in which we currently do business.
I already knew all this, but what the hell; in the finest tradition of anti-corporate guerrilla warfare, at least someone in the extended A-B dim-pire had to take a few minutes out of their day to be responsible to the concerns of an American citizen. Unfortunately, this relatively meek epilogue had barely been digested when another electronic missive came fluttering to rest in my computer mailbox:
Herr Curmudgeon—
I’ve always enjoyed reading your spleen-ventings. But what are you going to do about the Closing Of The Deal? I have incontrovertible inside info that Budvar and the Czechs have cut a deal with The Dark Lords of Anheuser: permission for A-B to sell Bud in Budvar’s markets will phase in over the next five years. In return, the Czechs got guarantees of purchases of their hops. We, the American beer-drinking public, get nothing. I cannot reveal my name, for my source is a lover who could lose her job if this got out. Call me Ishmael. But the information is rock-solid; Roger, the details of the deal are being drawn up now.
What am I going to do?
First I’m going to observe that this rumor is an old one that dates back at least two years, when it was widely speculated that Anheuser-Busch would try to put the screws to the hops farmers of the Czech Republic in an effort to leverage Budweiser Budvar into making a deal. It’s brilliant Machiavellian strategy that seeks to divide Budvar’s natural allies and turn them against the Czech brewer.
But is this sleazy effort still afoot? According to Terry Soloman of the ALExaminer on-line brewspaper, this may well be the case:
Did A-B Threaten To Boycott Czech Hops In Their Budvar Fight?
Prague, Czechoslovakia — Last week ugly rumors that Anheuser-Busch had strong-armed Czechoslovakian hop farmers, started emanating from that small European country. “They threatened to not buy our hops if they were not given the right to use the Budweiser name,” said ALE’s source in Prague. Apparently, Anheuser-Busch made it known through “the right persons,” that because of the good harvests at their own hop farms in the United States and Germany, A-B wouldn’t need the hops it usually buys from Czechoslovakian farmers any more. The source, who wishes to remain anonymous, tells ALE that A-B buys over 19% of the total Czech hop harvest each year, and that “much pressure” was exerted on Czech hop growers and their government to back A-B in their fight with the Czech brewer Budvar.
An unconfirmed rumor has A-B offering to buy approximately 12 percent of the Czech hop crop over the next 3-5 years, _IF_ it can get the rights it seeks from Budvar. The Czech brewer reportedly feels it no longer has a choice, and may finally be ready to give in to A-B’s demands. Interesting story if it’s true. I called A-B’s guru of public relations, Sandy Schenk, and asked him about the story. Sandy told me — on the record — that Anheuser-Busch “would neither confirm or deny the rumors.” I think — on the record — the story just got a whole lot more believable.
What am I going to do? For now, I intend to do nothing.
What can one lonely curmudgeon do when facing the money and the power of a massive corporation that historically has shown a glassy-eyed willingness to do anything, to crush anyone in order to achieve the megalomaniac visions of its ruling family?
Whether it’s the microbrewery whose products are dropped by a local A-B wholesaler, or a hardscrabble Czech hops grower who now catches a glimpse of merciless capitalism the way it is played by the last surviving robber barons, it’s all just pocket change to Three Sticks.
But I recalled Mitch Steele’s comment: “I’m curious to know how/why you feel the way you do regarding A-B.”
Aren’t the preceding two paragraphs indictment enough? Working for A-B must be like employment with the mafioso. So, on second thought, what am I going to do?
Two words, naturally: Molotov Cocktail.
(END of the 1998 article)
Next: 40 Years in Beer (Book II), Part 72: Mitch Steele attends a F.O.S.S.I.L.S. meeting (1998).
—
NOTES
(1) The 1997 and 1998 GABF medal winners in Barley Wine.
1997 Barley Wine
Bronze: Old Foghorn Barley Wine Anchor Brewing Co.
Silver: Sierra Nevada Bigfoot Barley Wine Sierra Nevada Brewing Co.
Gold: Bearded Pat’s Barley Wine Bluegrass Brewing Co.
1998 Barley Wine
Bronze: Old Bounder Barley Wine Ale Boundary Bay Brewery Co.
Silver: Code Blue Pacific Coast Brewing Co.
Gold: Bearded Pat’s Barley Wine Bluegrass Brewing Co.
(2) “Three Sticks” is a reference to August Busch the 3rd (III, literally: three sticks; 1937 – ), great-grandson of A-B’s founder Adolphus Busch. I’m not sure who coined this but it’s hilarious. As an aside, August Busch IV, son of Three Sticks and the last family member to control the brewery prior to its hostile takeover in 2008 by InBev, was once arrested for trying to fly a helicopter while intoxicated; in 2010, his girlfriend died of a drug overdose at his home. Nice chaps, those Busch boys.
(3) The background of my reference to Stone Phillips, his NBC News’ Dateline gig and their Samuel Adams Boston Lager contract-brewing hatchet job in 1996 is explained by Tom Acitelli at All About Beer.
On Sunday evening, Oct. 13, 1996, the sonorously calm voice of Stone Phillips, a host of NBC’s Dateline, eased into around eight million American households: “When it comes to beer, you’ve never had more choices on tap.”
The words were all too true, given the decade’s growth in the number of American breweries, brewpubs and brands of beer. But Phillips had not come to praise the growth. Instead, the segment he was introducing ended up helping to bury it.
In a voiceover—amid shots of colorful beer taps and glasses, and of tipplers assessing some rather unconventional brews—Phillips set up the question that Dateline was about to answer: “But do you know where some of those exotic and expensive specialty beers are really being made?”
(4) “Made-for-megabrewers” medal-winning beers from Mitch Steele and the A-B Specialty Brewing Group at the 1997 Great American Beer Festival.
- American-Style Amber Lager: Bronze, Red Wolf
- American-Style Dark Lager: Gold, Ziegenbock
- Non-alcoholic Malt Beverages: Bronze, Amber O’Doul’s
(5) In the spring of 1997, I just barely missed the glorious shuttering of A-B’s center for cultural imperialism. See: 40 Years in Beer (Book II) Part 52: “Anheuser-Busch, Gone Home,” our classic 1997 victory lap.
40 Years in Beer (Book II) Part 52: “Anheuser-Busch, Gone Home,” our classic 1997 victory lap