American brewing in the 1930’s – the end of Prohibition

As promised, more about American brewing in the 1930’s. This time from an article in the “Journal of the Institute of Brewing”, co-authored by A. Gusmer and H. Lloyd Hind.

The latter shouldn’t need any introduction as one of the foremost brewing scientists from between the wars. His “Brewing: Science and Practice” forms the backbone of my book “Peace!”.

British brewers must have been delighted with repeal. Their nightmare was for Prohibition to be introduced to the UK. Though after 1920 the possibility of that became more and more remote, with reduced pub opening times and reduced beer strength taking the wind from temperance campaigners sails.

Let’s crack on with the article.

“After fourteen years of Prohibition, the sale of beer in the United States was permitted on 7th April, 1933. At that time only beer containing 3.2 per cent, of alcohol by weight was allowed, inasmuch as such beers were declared to be non-intoxicating; and it was not until 5th December, 1933, that the so-called "repeal" took place, making it possible to brew beers of any strength desired. The conditions in the brewing trade of America are consequently very interesting at the present time. We see a very active trade, handicapped in some ways by the necessity to use old plant which had lain idle or been turned to other uses, but showing its virility by a desire to adopt the newest methods wherever it has been found possible to rebuild or expand.”
Journal of the Institute of Brewing, Volume 42, Issue 5, September-October 1936, page 415.

3.2% ABW, or 4% ABV, isn’t what I would call non-intoxicating. Sounds rather like a fiddle to get some booze back on the shelves before a proper repeal could be passed. I’d certainly take 4% ABV beer over nothing. Or the 0.5% ABW stuff they had to put up with during the dark days of Prohibition.

Fourteen years is a long time to have your brewing kit lying around unused. I can’t imagine many brewers investing money in maintaining it when there was no immediate prospect of being able to brew again.

Near beer wasn’t hugely popular:

“During Prohibition the brewers made a beverage which was allowed to contain not more than 0.5 per cent, of alcohol by volume, but large quantities of strong liquor were consumed, since Prohibition could not be enforced, and the nation was weaned from drinking such so-called beers. During the last few years of Prohibition only a few million barrels of "near beer" were sold yearly and this was produced by less than 100 breweries. It was, however, fortunate that a few more of the brewers had gone into the malt extract business, the malt extract being sold for home brewing, and had consequently kept their brewhouses in operation and condition, but the cellar equipment had mostly been dismantled. It was therefore necessary for the brewers to become very active, and, in order to lose no time, it was found most convenient to remodel and build breweries very much like those used before Prohibition.”
Journal of the Institute of Brewing, Volume 42, Issue 5, September-October 1936, page 415.

Allowing brewers to sell malt extract to home brewers seems like a pretty big hole in Prohibition. Was home brewing itself allowed? I would have thought not. So why allow production of something that can only really be used to make alcohol?

Obviously if you’re just making malt extract you don’t need most of your kit. Just the malt mill, mash tun and copper, as there won’t be any fermenting going on. That’s a pretty small percentage of a brewery’s machinery.

Now for some numbers.

“The figures for 1933 only cover the nine months period from 7th April when brewing was legalised. Despite the great increase in population the output for 1935 has only attained approximately 70 per cent, of the pre - Prohibition production of about 48,000,000 British barrels, but it is anticipated that 70,000,000 (100,000,000 American barrels) will be reached at no very distant date. The total beer sales for 1935 showed an increase of 12.5 per cent, over those for the year 1934. If the same ratio of increase is maintained during 1936, the consumption should amount to nearly 51,000,000 American barrels, or about 36,000,000 British barrels. The increase in cask trade amounted to 6 per cent, while that in bottles and cans reached nearly 33 per cent. In 1935 the proportion of sale in bottles and cans was nearly 30 per cent, of the total, compared with 25 per cent, in 1934. Ninety-five per cent, of the output is accounted for by eighteen States, New York leading with 17.4 per cent, of the total production, followed by Pennsylvania, Wisconsin, Illinois, Ohio and Michigan.”
Journal of the Institute of Brewing, Volume 42, Issue 5, September-October 1936, page 416.

Here’s the accompanying table:

Table I
United States Statistics of Fermented Malt Liquors
American barrels
Breweries operated.		Brls. produced.	Brls. taxed bottled.	Brls. taxed draught.	Total sales.	In store Dec. 31st.
1933	177	24,501,676	6,407,128	14,002,242	20,469,370	4,402,965
	582
1934	593	43,155,166	10,022,344	30,012,163	40,034,507	5,437,955
	686
1935	678	47,939,540	13,203,795	31,773,529	45,057,324	6,204,595
	674
British barrels
1933		17,700,000	4,600,000	10,100,000	14,700,000	3,200,000
1934		30,800,000	7,200,000	21,400,000	28,600,000	3,900,000
1935		34,300,000	9,500,000	22,800,000	32,300,000	4,500,000

You can see that there was a swing towards bottled beer right from the start.

Notice how production was concentrated in the two most populous eastern states, New York and Pennsylvania, and four Midwestern states Wisconsin, Illinois, Ohio and Michigan. If you remember that table of pre-Prohibition nationally-distributed bottled beers that they all came from the Midwest.

For comparison purposes, here’s UK beer output for the same period:

UK beer production (British barrels)
1933	17,950,303
1934	20,182,308
1935	20,864,814
Source:
Brewers' Almanack 1955, p. 50

Next we’ll be looking at raw materials and costs.