Monday 17 December 2012

Thrale Prize

It's that awardy time of year. Everyone's giving out their best this and best that. The I realised that there's something there isn't a prize for: beer history writing. So I've decided to start one.

The Thrale Prize will be awarded for the best piece of historical writing in the calendar year 2012. It will be decided by a committee of renowned beer historians. Well, one beer historian. Me.

Entry is free to everyone. Pieces can have appeared anywhere - blog, web page, print - or even not at all. Unpublished work is also eligible.

What do you have to do to enter? Just send me a URl, scan, copy, text document, whatever of the piece. The closing date is 31st December. You can either nominate your own work or the work of others.

What do you win? That's the best part. The winner can choose any of my wonderful books. And have the piece reproduced on this blog, if it's unpublished and that's what you'd like. I'll probably do some sort of certificate, too. Nothing fancy like an egraved tankard. I can't afford that shit.

22 comments:

Me said...

Are the Protz Shield and Papazian Cup being run again this year?

Anonymous said...

I would have a go at winning it myself but how can I compete against writers like Horst Dornbusch and Roger Protz?

Gary Gillman said...

Ron, are there any length requirements?

Gary

Ron Pattinson said...

Graeme, no. I'm going for a positive award this year.

Ron Pattinson said...

Gary, no. The only requirement is that it's beer history themed.

Alistair Reece said...

Ron,

I would have to nominate Evan Rail for the following posts:

http://www.beerculture.org/2012/08/29/on-the-founding-of-pilsner-urquell-part-i/

http://www.beerculture.org/2012/08/29/pilsner-urquell-founding-document-of-1839/

http://www.beerculture.org/2012/09/19/on-the-founding-of-pilsner-urquell-mistakes/

Ron Pattinson said...

Velky Al, very good choice.

Edward said...

Mitch Steele should get a mention for writing a mainstream homebrewing book on IPA and actually researching the history rather than just repeating the myths.

Ron Pattinson said...

Ed, another good choice.

Derek said...

I really enjoyed this piece:

http://zythophile.wordpress.com/2012/09/20/the-graveney-boat-a-hop-history-mystery/

Ron Pattinson said...

Derek, exactly the right sort of thing.

Ed said...

Ooooo...I wrote a history thing this year: http://edsbeer.blogspot.co.uk/2012/01/farnham-white-bine-hop.html

Possibly the second best article on Farnham Whitebine published this year!

Lisa Grimm (@lisagrimm) said...

This sounds like great fun. I'm not sure I've written anything awesome enough this year, but I have a fair few listed here:

http://www.lisagrimm.com/?page_id=338

Ron Pattinson said...

Ed, Lisa, thank you for your entries.

BeerBrarian said...

Do you accept political economy pieces? If so, http://beerbrarian.blogspot.com/2012/05/beer-of-small-states-in-world-markets.html

Ron Pattinson said...

Jacob, close enough. Much of history is politcs, after all. Count yourself submitted.

Tim Holt said...

Ron,

3 I've mentioned elsewhere:

‘Jews and Booze: Becoming American in the Age of Prohibition’ by Marni Davis (NYU Press)

Brewers and Distillers by Profession, a history of the Institute of Brewing & Distilling’ by Ray Anderson (IBD Publications)

‘Shakespeare's Local’ by Pete Brown (Macmillan)

plus

‘Intervention in the Modern UK Brewing Industry’ by John Spicer, Chris Thurman, John Walters and Simon Ward (Palgrave Macmillan)

Tim

Tim Holt said...

Oh, and Evan's work, a version of which will appear in the next issue of Brewery History.

Tim

Jeff Alworth said...

I'd throw Stan Hieronymus's new hops book in the mix. (For the Love of Hops.) Trying to extricate the agricultural and genomic history of hops is no easy task, and Stan made a good run at it. As a plus, I don't think anyone's approached the topic in anything like that level of depth.

arn said...

I'll nominate craig over at the drinkdrank blog for his work on the history of Albany ale.

Beer Made Clear said...

I third Evan Rail's nominations for the Plzn pieces. Also mentioning for nominations:

http://ghostsofdc.org/2012/06/06/growler-beer-ban-1905/

http://ghostsofdc.org/2012/09/04/white-house-beer-party/

Ali Kocho-Williams said...

A little late perhaps, but I wrote on early Soviet Beer in Zymurgy (March 2012). I can't link as it's members only content on the web, but it appeared in print.