Oldest American Beer?

Actual *beer*- as in the same recipe? Or the oldest brand/brewery?

Yeungling in Pottsville, PA., is the oldest brewery in the US, but, obviously, their current line-up of beers probably has little or no relationship to the beers they were brewing in 1829 (a time when lager yeast was yet to be introduced in the US)- and that goes for every other "old" beer brand that dates back to the mid- to late-Nineteenth century, as well (Coors, Pabst, Miller, Budweiser, etc).

Maybe he actually wants *really* old beer! :-)

Yeah, I thought of that, too. I still occassionally come across a dusty

4 pack of a Heavyweight product in NJ and recently found a few six packs of Grant's IPA on a shelf, too (those are pretty old by now, aren't they?)- but the actual "oldest" I guess would be an interesting challenge given the way a lot of beer stores coolers look...

Think the oldest I was ever served, tho' (outside of a vintage beer, of course) was when I was surprised to see Ballantine Ale listed on the menu of this Raymond Chandler-esque bar in LA, in 1976 (by then Falstaff was already pulling back distribution of the brand- which was once national). I was served a bottle that was brewed by Ballantine in Newark, which closed in March, '72.

snipped-for-privacy@LY0S.CM wrote on 26 Apr 2007:

More recently, I was served an Anchor Steam at a Columbus frat-boy bar in June of 2003, with a date code from mid-1999.

I was offered a second one at no charge. I declined.

Witzel

Cousin Jimmy's Bait Shop?

Phil

Phil wrote on 27 Apr 2007:

The bar's name is lost to time, sadly. It was close enough to OSU campus to clearly cater to the college crowd. I thought I was lucky, spying Anchor bottles in the cooler behind the bar. No Bud for me!

Witzel

On Wed, 25 Apr 2007 16:39:42 -0500, Brain63 wrote (in article ):

I believe Yuengling, from Pottsville, Pennsylvania, makes the claim of being "America's Oldest Brewery" but the qualification not stated is that they are talking about the United States. Molson, of Canada, has been in business longer.

The place I'm thinking of is Brother Jimmy's Bait Shack. It's on 92nd and 3rd. It's strictly a college bar and good for what it is.

Phil

Phil wrote on 27 Apr 2007:

Yeah, but I was in Columbus. Ohio. OSU. Brother Jimmy's is not without its charm (I could say that about all three of them) though they're all about the same distance from Columbus, Ohio.

Witzel

I thought you meant Columbus Avenue. My bad.

Phil

Jeebus, Phil, you need to get out more.

I'm out quite a bit.... but I'm out in New York City, as is Dave.

Phil

Thing is, I've bumped into Dave recently, and it wasn't in NYC. I've never bumped into you anywhere. In small words: life exists outside NYC. Some might even say *better* life.

Don't worry about it. New York is a big place.

Some also say that marrying your sister is a right fine thing to do.

Phil

I actually get annoyed by the number of bars here in NYC that don't have decent beers. Even some of the ones that do don't know how to server them or store them.

On the bright side things seem to be getting better.

Are you telling me that old English ale wasn't in the colonies back in the

1700s?

No.....

Obviously, there were many breweries in the US and in the "colonies" before 1829, only that Yeungling- the brewery- is the oldest *still in business*- but it was by no means the "first".

The OP asked "What *is* the oldest American beer still sold?"

So the word "is" eliminates the many breweries that the Dutch set up in what is now New York City starting around the early 1600's, as well as those in Virginia and Plymouth by the English (I don't care how poor the local shop is a rotating their stock, nobody's selling Oloff Van Courtlandt's ale from New Amsterdam anymore).

Also, any "old English ale" that was shipped over to the colonies wouldn't qualify as an "American" beer.

I prefer New Amersterdam to New York. Better place, less crime.

"Yuengling" bears no resemblence beyond the name to what they were selling even in the 1950's.

When my dad had a good week, he bought Stegmaier's. When he couldn't afford Steg, he got a case of Yuengling.

rr