Monday, December 24, 2018

Winter Brothers Brewery Pittsburgh

I found articles on the death of Frank (son) and Wolfgang (father) Winter and found an error. Reports on the death of Wolfgang contains an error so I am correcting it here.

The Brewers Journal, Volume 58, Issues 7-11, 1922 and Find a Grave.com reported on the death of Wolfgang Winter. Mr. Winter was one of the owners of the M. Winter Brothers Brewery in Pittsburgh’s South Side. After selling the company to the Pittsburgh Brewing Company in 1899 he and his brother, Michael moved to Orange New Jersey where they opened the Orange Brewery. The third brother, Alois, remained in Pittsburgh as superintendent of the Winter Brewery for PBC. Both the Brewers Journal and Find a Grave are both in error. The Journal got some family history wrong and the Grave copied it.


They reported that Wolfgang worked in Pittsburgh and Homestead, Pa. This reference did not apply to Wolfgang but rather his son, Frank M. Winter. Frank was born in Chicago when the brothers were living in Chicago before moving to Pittsburgh. The Pittsburgh Press on December 26, 1939 reported on the death of Frank. The Press had Frank being “associated all his life with brewery firms, having worked for the Homestead Brewery, the Pittsburgh Brewing Company and recently with the Washington Brewery”. I hope anyone researching the Winter family will find their way here and not repeat the error. I can't find a better title to identify this in search engines so you see what I did.

Monday, December 3, 2018

Allegheny County Pa. Breweries Count

This is the status and count of all the breweries that currently exist in Allegheny County, Pa, and those in the past and proposed. Proposed breweries are those who have received a conditional permit from the Pa. LCB. Please be advised that the data on the LCB website has errors and omissions as not all that is shown has been updated. This list is accurate as of December 2, 2018.

37 Active Breweries
1            180 and Tapped Brewery (Commercial)            Active
2            412 Brews (Brewery) (Commercial)            Active
3            Allegheny City Brewery            Active
4            American Beverage (Commercial) Active (makers of Daily's Little Hugs)
5            Aurochs Brewery             Active
6            Cinderlands Brewery            Active
7            Cobblehause Brewery            Active
8            Copper Kettle Brewery (Brew Your Own)            Active
9            Costar Brewery (Garage-Commercial)            Active
10            Couch Brewery            Active
11            Dancing Gnome Brewery            Active
12            East End Brewery            Active
13            Eleventh Hour Brewery            Active
14            Enix Brewery            Active
15            Grist House Brewery            Active
16            Helicon Brewery            Active
17            Hitchhiker Brewery            Active
18            Hofbrauhause Brewery            Active
19            Hop Yard Brewery            Active
20            Insurrection Brewery            Active
21            Kim's Dog House Brewery            Active (down the street from Insurrection)
22            Lawrecnceville Brewery dba Church Brew Works            Active
23            Mindful Brewery            Active
24            Penn Brewery             Active
25            Pig Hill Brewery             Active
26            Pittsburgh Bottle Shop & Brewhouse Active with recent new owner
27            Rivertowne Brewery            Active
28            Rock Bottom Brewery            Active
29            Roundabout Brewery            Active
30            Southern Tier Brewery            Active
31            Spoonwood Brewery            Active
32            Spring Hill Brewery            Active
33            Strange Roots Experimental Ales Gibsonia            Active
34            The Brew Gentlemen Brewery            Active
35            The Leaning Cask Brewery            Active
36            The Parkway Theater Brewery            Active
37            War Streets Brewery - Biers Pub            Active

10 Breweries that closed
1            Draai Laag Brewery Alison Park            Closed
2            Draai Laag Brewery Millvale            Closed
3            Iron City Brewery Lawrenceville            Closed
4            John Harvard's Brew House            Closed
5            Milkman Brewery            Closed
6            Penn Brewery             Closed but reopened (don't get me started on this)
7            Strip Brewery            Closed
8            Sweet Water Brewery dba Foundry Ale Works            Closed
9            Three Rivers Brewery            Closed
10           Valhalla Brewery Strip District            Closed

5 Breweries that moved to a new location and remain active.
1            Aurochs Brewery             Moved
2            East End Brewing            Moved
3            Hitchhiker Brewery            Moved
4            Pig Hill Brewery 1            Moved
5            War Streets Brewery            Moved

As it says
1            Three Mugs Brew Pub            Never Opened
2            Robber Baron Brewery            Never Opened
1            Inner Groove Brewery Verona            Pending
2            Copper Kettle Brewery Bloomfield            Planning
1            Grist House Brewery Collier Township            Planniung
1            Allegheny Brewery & Pub            Renamed Penn Brewery
2            Trios Brewery            Renamed Enix Brewery
1            Acrospire Brewery            Safekeeping
2            Cinderlands Brewery Strip District            Safekeeping
3            Lincoln Avenue Brewery Bellvue            Safekeeping
4            Rogan Brewery Duquesne            Safekeeping
5            Stonewall Cider House and Meadery Verona            Safekeeping

1            Arsenal Cider House & Wine Cellar            Special
Note: Arsenal received a pending brewing license by the Pa.  LCB but let let go expired. This was for the Penn Hills location that is currently in production.

If we count the 37 active breweries plus 9 of the 10 closed we have 46 breweries that have been in production since 1989. I am not counting the two that never opened or Arsenal.
This list will be posted with more information on www.pittsburghbrewers.com


Saturday, April 7, 2018

Eberhardt & Ober Brewery Fire of 1883

Storues about the Penn Brewery building burning down in 1883 are wrong.

In 1883 The Eberhardt and Ober Brewing Company bought the John Straub Brewing Company. Both breweries were located on Pittsburgh’s North Side in the Deutschtown neighborhood. That same year Eberhardt & Ober (E & O) rebuilt the stock house on Vinial Street. That building is known today as the Penn Brewery. The Straub Brewery on nearby South Canal Street was reconfigured to become a grain elevator. It has been written numerous times that the stock house was destroyed by fire in 1883 and rebuilt as the building we know today. This is incorrect. Somehow the date of the fire was misread by a writer and what he wrote was copied time and time again. To be clear, the stock house, currently the Penn Brewery, was never on fire.

William Eberhardt and Peter Ober were related by marriage as Peter married William’s sister Sarah in 1871. The Conrad Eberhardt Brewery was adjacent to the George Ober Brewery and the two families obviously engaged with each other. Things happen. The two breweries were however independent of one another.

William was the son on Conrad Eberhardt, who foundered the Eagle Brewery in 1852. William took control in 1870 when his father retired from the business. Peter was the son of George Ober who took control of the Amber Brewery sometie after 1860. George had three sons, Frank, Charles and Peter. Peter, for some reason did not stay with his family’s brewery but joined William in 1870. When the William Ober Brewing Company bought Straub in 1883 Peter had become a partner and the company became the Eberhardt & Ober Brewing Company.

The year when E & O bought Straub the company enlarged operations as the rebuilding of the stock house and grain elevator illustrates. The grain elevator was located on South Cannel Street between Chestnut Street and X Street. The rail line that we see today running through the North Side next to the Heinz plant was at the time a branch of the Pennsylvania Cannel. The cannel played a small part in Pittsburgh’s brewing history as John Straub (not related to Peter from St. Marys) had yeast shipped from Philadelphia to Pittsburgh in1848 on the cannel. That yeast enabled Straub to make Pittsburgh’s first lager beer.

Adjacent to Straub’s old brewery was the Godfrey & Clark Paper Company and the Heinz Pickle factory. On Aprl4, 1893, a fire broke out in the paper company at 2:30 in the afternoon. This made national news and the reports from several newspapers are exhibited below:

April 5, 1893
The Newark Advocate from Newark, Ohio · Page 1
THE DAILY ADVOCATE. YOLUME XXXIT.. NEWARK, OHIO, WEDNESDAY, APRIL 5 1893 DESTRUCTIVE FIRE. Valuable Property Destroyed in Allegheny City. LOSS NEARLY HALF A MILLION.

Eberhardt & Ober, the Godfrey Clark Paper Company and the H. J. Heinz Pickle Company, Besides a Number of Small Property Owners, Burned Out.

Allegheny City was visited by fire yesterday evening, which destroyed about $400,000 worth of property. The principal sufferers were: Eberhardt Ober, the Godfrey Clark Paper company and the H. J. Heinz Pickle company, besides a number of small property owners. The fire is supposed to have been caused by a spark from their own smokestack flying into an open window of the sorting room of Godfrey Clark's warehouse. It spread rapidly, enveloping that building in flames and then spreading to the malthonse, warehouse and elevator of Eberhardt & Ober Brewing Company. The Allegheny department, after a futile attempt to stay the course of-the fire, summoned aid from Pittsburg. The firemen fought hard, but did not succeed in getting control of the fire until a late hour last night. The fire burned over the best part of two blocks, also destroying the lumber yard and planning will of Kopp Voeghtly, the old Hope cotton mill building, occupied by the H. J. Heinz Pickle company as a warehouse, and a number of dwellings, A number of minor accidents occurred. The losses as near as can be obtained are: Eberhardt & Ober, $75,000' on building, insured for $44.000; stock $125,000, insured for $50,000; Godfrey Clark, $25.000 on building, insured for $20,000; $35,000 on stock, insured for $31,000: E. M. Ferguson, owner of the Hope cotton mill building, $22,000; insurance not known; H, J.- Heinz Pickle company, on stock, $20.000, partially insured; four houses owned by Thomas Loughery, $10,000, small insurance: Kopp Voeghtly, lumber yard and planning mill, $30,000, insurance not known; a number of dwelling houses, stc., increasing the loss to $400,000. Eberhardt & Ober were unable last night to furnish a list of the companies for which they were insured. Godfrey Clark are insured in 30 different companies, in sums ranging from $500 to $3,000, the principal companies being the Mutual of New York for $5,500 and the Columbia of Louisville for $3,000. This is the fourth time they have burned out in 15 years, their losses amounting to $410,000. with a total insurance only of $110,000. Both companies will rebuild at once.

April 5, 1893
Lincoln Daily News from Lincoln, Nebraska · Page 2

Pittsburgh, April 5. At 2 o'clock Tuesday afternoon fire broke out on the second floor of the ' paper warehouse; of Godfrey & Clark on South Canal street. Allegheny, and a general alarm was sent in, and within an hour the lavc frame building, which was filled with a stock of paper, was totally destroyed. At 3:4o o'clock the flames had communicated to the 5-story malt house of Eberhardt & Ober's brewery. The strong-wind fanned the flames into intense hot waves, which fairly melted that building and contents to the ground. The wind drove the flames to the midst of a row of brick and frame dwellings on South Canal street. Aid From Pitttslurg Chief 31 u ?hy telephoned to the Pittsburg fire department for aid, which sent. Before the two companies in Pittsburg had arrived, the dwellings were in flames and their total destruction was only a question of time. 3:43 the large lumber yard and planning mill of Klopp & Voegtly, on Cannel street, was on fire, and the Heinz Picke1 works were in danger. Five hours later, the Hope Cotton mill, on Ma., street, became ignited and was soon destroyed. Three dwellings in the rear of the cotton mill also caught about that time and were also destroyed. At o'clock it was thought the fire was under control. Iy is reported that a child was burned to death and that several residents of the South Cannel street dwellings were seriously injured. Total losses at this writing cannot be estimated. Firemen injured. Robert Badger and John Bohneyo, the firemen injured by falling walls, regained consciousness shortly after their arrival at the Allegheny general hospital, and will recover. The report that a child had been burned to death, also that a number of people had been seriously injured, is not correct. Several, however, were slightly burned. A correct statement of losses and insurance is as follows: The Losses. Eberhardt & Ober, grain elevator slightly burned. A correct statement of losses and insurance is as follows: Eberhardt & Ober, grain elevator and malt house with contents, worth $175,000 insured for $94,0O0; Godfrey & Clarke, paper warehouse and contents, $65,000, insured for $30,000: Samuel Martin, three residences worth $-5,001', insured for $10 000. The lumberyard and planning mill owned by Klopp & Voegtly, as well as the Hope cotton mill, in which H. J. Heinze had stored a large quantity of stock, was damaged to a considerable extent but not beyond repair, ad was the other property enumerated above. The high wind carried burning embers to an almost incredible distance and many blocks away people were kept busy extinguishing small fires, which caught on the roofs of their residences.