To celebrate International Beer Day (the first Friday in August), we decided to follow up our first Beer Facts post with some more quirky and fun facts about beer.
HISTORIC
Oktoberfest (the world’s largest beer festival, held in Munich, Germany each year) originally started when the people of Munich were invited to celebrate the marriage of Crown Prince Ludwig in 1810. Only beer that conforms to the German Beer Purity Law, and brewed within Munich, can be served at Oktoberfest. During the 2013 celebrations, 7,700,000 liters of beer were served across the 16 days.
EARLY ADOPTER
George Washington was a huge beer fan. He would write his own recipes for making beer, and purchase large orders of beer from his favorite suppliers in England. During his presidency, his favorite domestic brewer in the area was Robert Hare of Philadelphia, and certainly helped many Americans turn to American-made beer during his era.
KERCHING!
Ringing in at $160, Samuel Adams’ Utopias series is America’s most expensive beer, based on original market price. Each batch is aged for up to 19 years in a variety of bourbon barrels, cognac casks, sherry barrels, and rum barrels, and is limited to just a few thousand bottles each release. Early batches would often break the then record for the highest gravity beer, and sometimes become banned in certain US States.
TRAGEDY
In 1814 a three-story-tall beer vat exploded at Bainbridge Street Brewery in London, which unleashed a 388,000 gallon ‘beer wave’ into the neighboring streets of the St Giles district. Eight people lost their lives as the beer (a porter) flooded down streets, sweeping up residents and destroying the already-fragile homes and buildings in the area.
WINNING
After winning the Nobel Prize in Physics in 1922, Danish physicist Niels Bohr was given a house by the Carlsberg brewery. The house had its own beer pipeline, with a constant flow of fresh beer coming directly from the brewery.
WEE HEAVY
Wife Carrying World Championships are held every year in Sonkajärvi, Finland. The first contest was held in 1992, and each year the grand prize is the wife’s weight in beer. The length of the official track is 253.5 meters, and it has two dry obstacles and a water obstacle about one meter deep. The last five years, the world championship has been won by Taisto Miettinen and Kristiina Haapanen.
THIRSTY
The top five U.S. states for beer consumption per capita are: 5. Wisconsin (36.2 gallons per capita); 4. South Dakota (38.1 gallons per capita); 3. Montana (40.5 gallons per capita); 2. New Hampshire (42.2 gallons per capita); 1. North Dakota (43.3 gallons per capita). Why do the northern Midwest states rank so highly? Some say it is partly due to strong German and Scandenavian ancestry, and a love of outdoorsy hobbies that incorporate the drinking of beer (hunting, fishing, etc.)
MAGICAL
Bavarian Beer Week in Germany is celebrated every April to commemorate April 23, 1516 when Duke Wilhelm IV and Duke Ludwig X proclaimed the Bavarian Beer Purity Law (also see: Oktoberfest). One highlight of the week is the opening day, when local Munich breweries donate around 1000 liters of beer to be dispensed from an open air beer fountain, free for public consumption.
SPACE
The moon has a crater named Beer. A relatively small lunar impact crater located on the Mare Imbrium. Just to the northwest is the matching twin Feuillée. Look it up, next time you are in the neighborhood.
Bonus beer knowledge: Watch our video of How To Pour The Perfect Beer.
Cheers to Beer Facts!
by Bottleneck Management.