Friday 13 November 2015

Branded Pale Ale in 1953

Brands: don’t you just love them? Saves having to think too hard about your purchases. Which is presumably why big breweries were so keen on them.

Pale Ales, which were the flagship of many breweries, were some of the beers most likely to be branded. Many breweries pushed strong bottled Pale Ales back in the 1950’s. Things like Ben Truman, Double Diamond or Red Barrel. Which tells you how complete the Brewery Manual list is as it contains only one of those names. Many of these beers also became keg brands.

Intriguingly not only is simple Diamond in the list, but also another beer called Diamond Ale from another brewery. Odd that a large brewer like Ind Coope should be using a brand name that they didn’t have exclusive rights to.

Talking of missing brands, I don’t see the two biggest Pale Ale ones: Bass Red Triangle and Worthington White Shield. I could probably think of more, if I put my mind to it.

Names like “All Bright”, “Starbright” and “Sunbright” were common for filtered bottled beers. The name obviously intended to conjure up an imagine brilliantly clear beer.

Label colours – Red Label and Green Label – were also well liked. Though here’s another inconsistency in this list. Flowers Green Label is cited as a generic trade mark for their bottled beer. When it was in fact the name of a specific bottled Pale Ale.

Webster’s Green Label is lumped in the Pale Ales. Even though it was a Light Mild. In the book’s defence, Webster’s were always a little coy about its style. I can remember the TV ads for it, from which I assumed it was a Bitter.

Coincidentally, that’s the only one of these beers I drank. At least under the name given. I was rather partial to Burton Ale, the cask version of Double Diamond.

Branded Pale Ale in 1953
Brewery Beer Type
H. & G. Simonds Golden Dry Pale Ale
A. M. & E. Sergeant Dolphin Pale Ale
Ann St. Brewery Mary Ann Pale Ale
Castletown Brewery Red Label Pale Ale
Drybrough Starbright Pale Ale
Gardner Cavalier Pale Ale
Gardner Extra Pale Ale
George Younger & Son Highland Pale Ale
H. & G. Simonds Bulldog Pale Ale
H. & G. Simonds Tavern Pale Ale
H. B. Clark County's Best Pale Ale
H. E. Thornley Sunbright Pale Ale
Hall & Woodhouse Forum Pale Ale
Ind Coope & Allsopp Coronet Pale Ale
Ind Coope & Allsopp Double Diamond Pale Ale
Ind Coope & Allsopp Diamond Pale Ale
John Lovibond & Sons Royal College Pale Ale
Meux's Brewery Treble Gold Pale Ale
Morrell's Brewery Ltd. Castle Ale Pale Ale
Richard Whitaker & Sons Light Shire Pale Ale
Saml. Webster & Sons Green Label Pale Ale
T. Losco Bradley Gold Gross Pale Ale
The Ely Brewery Brewers Own Pale Ale
The Ely Brewery Imperial Pale Ale
The Star Brewery Diamond Ale Pale Ale
Tomson & Wotton Double Allbright Pale Ale
Truswell's Brewery Sunbright Pale Ale
Wilson's Brewery Olympic  Pale Ale
Source:
Brewery Manual 1953-1954, pages 382 - 394.


Probably Old Ale and Strong Ale next.

4 comments:

Mike said...

I remember Double Diamond in a tin. Their ads were something along the lines of "A Double Diamond works wonders", I don't recall the wonders it was supposed to work, just that it was the first tinned beer I ever bought.

Anonymous said...

So is a light mild a pale ale as opposed to a Pale Ale ? :)

Ron Pattinson said...

Marquis,

exactly.

Ron Pattinson said...

Mike,

A double Diamond works wonders so drink one today. Couldn't get away with that slogan now.