The German Immigrant Invasion
Ah, the scent of crisp, golden lager – a taste of Bavaria right here in the heart of our beloved Up and Under Pub. But how did this bubbly beverage become America’s most popular libation, gracing the shelves from convenience stores to the finest establishments? Well, my friends, it all started with a little German invasion.
In the mid-19th century, throngs of German immigrants flooded the shores, bringing with them their beloved Bavarian lager recipes. These resourceful brewers quickly grew the lager industry into a powerhouse, aggressively promoting their effervescent wares to the American palate. They even managed to turn war and tragedy into opportunity, cementing their dominance through the adoption of new industrial technologies and constant recipe improvements.
The German Triangle
Nearly 5 million German immigrants entered the United States between 1820 and 1900, many flocking to the growing manufacturing hubs around the Midwest – a region known as the “German Triangle,” encompassing St. Louis, Milwaukee, and Cincinnati. It was here that these skilled craftsmen brought over the yeast and recipes for the beloved Bavarian lagers and golden pilsners.
These bubbly, palish beers, taking anywhere from six weeks to eight months to ferment in temperatures slightly above freezing, had a distinct advantage over the darker, shorter-fermented Anglo-inspired ales that had previously dominated American beer consumption. You see, ales had a tendency to sour quickly, limiting the batch size and market reach of their brewers. But these lagers could be stored for much longer periods, allowing the German innovators to expand their operations and quench the growing thirst of the nation.
The Rise of the Beer Barons
By the mid-1870s, an estimated 4,000 German breweries had popped up around the country, becoming neighborhood hubs in the growing cities. And with this influx of new brewers came the rise of the beer barons – entrepreneurial titans who forged brewing dynasties across America.
There was Adolphus Busch, at the helm of his father-in-law Eberhard Anheuser’s operation in St. Louis. Christian Moerlein in Cincinnati. George Ehret, who ran the Hell Gate Brewery in New York City. And let’s not forget Jacob Ruppert, another New Yorker who bought the struggling New York Yankees in 1915, using his beer profits to build Yankee Stadium and hire legends like Babe Ruth.
But the true epicenter of this brewing boom was Milwaukee, which by the late 19th century boasted four of the world’s largest German-owned breweries and became the top beer-producing city globally for years. This intense rivalry between the likes of Frederick Pabst and Joseph Schlitz fueled innovation and expansion as they vied to grow the market for their German lagers.
Tragedy, War, and Technological Advancements
To attract non-German drinkers, these beer barons had to get creative. They found opportunities in both tragedy and war to promote their wares.
Take the Great Chicago Fire of 1871 – a devastating event that left 100,000 people homeless and leveled 18,000 structures, including virtually all of the city’s breweries. Pabst, with his newer steam-powered ship, was able to quickly move barrels of lager south, buying up warehouse space in Chicago to store them. Meanwhile, Schlitz transported his beer by rail and gave free samples to the forlorn survivors, fostering goodwill and spreading the crisp, light lager taste to more non-German palates.
Just a decade earlier, Schlitz had made a similarly savvy move during the Civil War, shipping ice-chilled barrels down the Mississippi River to the 200,000 German immigrants fighting for the Union. Germans comprised the largest ethnic contingent in the Union Army – one out of every ten soldiers. And all along the river and near the battlefields, these soldiers mixed with locals, further spreading the lager love.
Technological advancements also played a crucial role in the German brewers’ dominance. Steam engines improved shipping and brewing, while the arrival of refrigeration and artificial cooling in the 1870s allowed lager makers to store their beer for longer and ship it farther. Countrywide, these innovators kept tweaking their recipes, searching for the perfect ingredients to create a crisper, cleaner, and more bubbly brew with an extended shelf life.
The World’s Fair Showdown
The climactic showdown between the beer barons came at the 1893 Chicago World’s Fair, where Pabst and Schlitz vied on the international stage for the title of America’s top brewer. Showcasing their beers to more than 27 million visitors, Schlitz took prizes for three of his lagers, but Pabst’s Best Select beer earned the top honors. From that day forward, it was christened Pabst Blue Ribbon – a name that has endured for over a century.
The Temperance Backlash
But the German-dominated beer industry didn’t have it all their way. Opponents soon emerged, decrying the “double scourge” of immigrants and alcohol. The anti-alcohol temperance movement, driven mostly by Anglo Protestants, made strides in the 1850s, with 13 states banning the sale of alcoholic beverages altogether.
Lager-loving Germans and whiskey-soaked Irishmen were often lumped together as targets, with beer being blamed for ills ranging from domestic violence and political corruption to gambling and prostitution. In the battle for public morals, these immigrant communities faced an uphill struggle.
Yet for Germans, drinking beer was not just the province of rowdy men in pubs – it was a cherished part of their daily lives and culture. They established open-air beer gardens where families, couples, and young revelers would gather on Sundays to socialize, listen to live music, and enjoy the outdoors – with beer, of course, flowing freely.
The Battle for Morals
The temperance fight in the 1850s overlapped with nativist anti-immigrant movements like the Know-Nothing Party, which sometimes employed violence. In 1855, the Know-Nothings in Chicago elected mayor Levi Boone, who increased saloon license fees six-fold and hired a nativist police force to close saloons on Sundays. That same year, a protest over the trial of eight German saloon keepers sparked a violent police crackdown, ending in one death and several dozen arrests.
The morals fight even spilled onto the baseball diamond. In 1878, the relatively new National Baseball League, seeking to sanitize its image, stopped selling alcohol in stadiums, banned Sunday games, and hiked ticket prices out of reach for the working class. Fans of a team in Protestant Worcester, Massachusetts, complained about league stadiums full of “drunkards, gamblers, and prostitutes.” The league expelled the team from Cincinnati – a heavily German-American city – when its president refused to follow the new rules. Six teams responded by bolting from the league, including four from the German-heavy cities of St. Louis, Cincinnati, Baltimore, and Philadelphia. They formed the American Association, derogatively called the “Beer and Whiskey League,” which eventually became the American League in Major League Baseball.
The Downfall
After the turn of the century, opposition to the German-American brewers intensified. During World War I, anti-German sentiment made life and business considerably harder for these immigrant communities. And in 1920, the passage of Prohibition, banning alcohol sales nationwide, dealt the death blow to all beer gardens and breweries – except for the large, adaptable players with national brands, including Pabst Blue Ribbon, Schlitz, Miller, and what would merge into Anheuser-Busch.
When Prohibition ended in 1933, only these giants remained, having found ways to weather the storm. The smaller, more localized brewers that had once dominated the landscape were gone, victims of a combination of nativist backlash, temperance crusades, and, ultimately, federal legislation.
The Effervescent Legacy
But the legacy of those pioneering German brewers lives on in the effervescent echoes of the beer industry they built. Their resourcefulness, innovation, and unwavering entrepreneurial spirit paved the way for the vibrant pub culture we celebrate today at the Up and Under and countless other establishments across the country.
So the next time you savor a crisp, golden lager at our beloved pub, raise a glass to the German immigrants who brought this delightful brew to America’s shores. Their story is woven into the very fabric of our nation’s beer-soaked history – a history that continues to fizz and froth with each sip.
