Milds I have known

With Mild Month almost upon us, I'm getting all nostalgic. Thinking about those Milds I drank early in my drinking career. Beers which have almost all disappeared.

The 1978 Good Beer Guide lists 104 cask Milds being produced. Which isn't that far short of one per brewery. Of course, there were more Milds being brewed. As some breweries only produced evil keg versions. Bastards. Obviously, I never drank any of that muck.

My enthusiasism as a Mild drinker is is reflected in the number of the examples I tried - about two-thirds. And that's only the ones I'm sure about . You could probably add in another dozen or so maybes.

There were some real crackers in this disparate bunch. Courage Heavy, for example. Which was a rare Southwestern Mild. Even in 1978 Mild was a rarity in England's bottom left pointy bit. I only ever drank it at the Great British Beer Festival.

And the GBBF explains why I managed to get around so many. I worked at the early editions held at Alexandra Palace. Already being annoyingly fanatical about beer, but about especially Mild, I made a point of trying as many as I could. The GBBF being a good spot for that as many of the Southern Milds were already becoming difficult to track down in the wild.

How many Milds are regularly available now? And how many have you been able to tag?

Cask Mild in 1977
Brewer	Beer	Style	OG	tried?
Adnams	Mild	Mild	1032	Y
Ansell	Mild	Mild	1035.5	Y
Banks	Mild	Mild	1035.5	Y
Bateman	Mild	Mild	1032	Y
Batham	Mild	Mild	1036	Y
Belhaven	60/- Light	Mild	1031	Y
Boddingtons	Mild	Mild	1031	Y
Border	Exhibition Mild	Mild	1032.2
Border	Mild	Mild	1031.6
Brains	Dark	Mild	1035	Y
Brakspear	XXX	Mild	1031	Y
Matthew Brown	Mild	Mild	1031	Y
Buckley	Mild	Mild	1032	Y
Burt	BMA	Mild	1030
Burtonwood	Dark Mild	Mild	1031.8	Y
Camerons	Mild	Mild	1033
Castletown	Mild	Mild	1036
Charrington	Mild	Mild	1034.6
Courage (London)	Mild	Mild	1032.5
Courage (Plymouth)	Heavy	Mild	1032	Y
Courage (Reading)	Mild	Mild	1032
Darley	Mild	Mild	1032	Y
Davenport	Mild	Mild	1033	Y
Devenish (Redruth)	XXX	Mild	1033
Donnington	XXX	Mild	1033
Elgood	Mild	Mild	1030	Y
Everards	Mild	Mild	1033	Y
Felinfoel	Mild	Mild	1032	Y
Fuller	Hock	Mild	1031.5	Y
Gale	Dark Mild (XXX)	Mild	1031
Greenall Whitley	Dark Mild	Mild	1033.7	Y
Greenall Whitley (Wem)	Wem Mild	Mild	1033	Y
Greene King (Biggleswade)	XX	Mild	1030.8
Greene King (Bury)	Mild (XX)	Mild	1030.8
Guernsey	LBA Mild	Mild	1036.6
Hansons	Mild	Mild	1035	Y
Hardys & Hansons	Best Mild	Mild	1035.4	Y
Hartleys	Mild	Mild	1032	Y
Harvey	XX	Mild	1030	Y
Higson	Mild	Mild	1033.4	Y
Holden	Mild	Mild	1036
Holt	Mild	Mild	1033.4	Y
Home	Mild	Mild	1036.1	Y
Hook Norton	Mild	Mild	1032
Hoskins	Mild	Mild	1033	Y
Hull	Mild	Mild	1032.25	Y
Hydes	Mild	Mild	1032	Y
Jennings	Mild	Mild	1033	Y
King & Barnes	XX (Mild)	Mild	1031.6	Y
Lees	Best Mild	Mild	1035	Y
Maclay	60/- Light	Mild	1030	Y
Marston	Merrie Monk	Mild	1043	Y
Marston	Mild	Mild	1032	Y
Mitchell	Mild	Mild	1034	Y
Mitchell & Butler (Birmingham)	Mild	Mild	1034.6	Y
Mitchell & Butler (Walsall)	Highgate Mild	Mild	1034	Y
Morland	Mild (XX)	Mild	1032	Y
Morrell	Dark Mild	Mild	1032.6	Y
Okell	Mild	Mild	1035.2
Oldham	Mild	Mild	1031.7	Y
Paine	Extra Special	Mild	1032
Randall (Guernsey)	Bobby Mild	Mild	1035
Ridley	XXX (or Mild)	Mild	1030
Robinson	Best Mild	Mild	1032	Y
St Austell	XXXX	Mild	1032
Shepherd Neame	Mild	Mild	1031	Y
Shipstone	Mild	Mild	1034.6	Y
Simpkiss	Mild	Mild	1034	Y
Taylor	Dark Mild	Mild	1033.4	Y
Tennent	60/-	Mild	1031
Tetley	Mild	Mild	1032	Y
Tetley Walker	Mild	Mild	1032	Y
Theakston (Masham)	Dark Mild	Mild	1032	Y
Three Tuns	Mild	Mild	1032
Thwaites	Best Mild	Mild	1033	Y
Thwaites	Mild	Mild	1031	Y
Tolly Cobbold	Mild	Mild	1030	Y
Vaux	Mild	Mild	1030.2	Y
Ward	Best Mild	Mild	1034	Y
Welsh Brewers	Worthington Dark Mild or Dash	Mild	1033.3	Y
Whitbread (Marlow)	Dark Mild	Mild	1030.6
Whitbread (Portsmouth)	Mild	Mild	1031.5
Whitbread (Rhymney)	WBM	Mild	1034.1
Whitbread (Romsey)	Mild	Mild	1031.5
Wilsons	Great Northern Mild	Mild	1032.2	Y
Yates & Jackson	Mild	Mild	1030.1	Y
Young & Co	Mild or Best Malt Ale	Mild	1030	Y
All Nations	Mild	Mild, Light	1032
Bass (Burton)	Light Mild (or M)	Mild, Light	1033.1
Boddingtons	Best Mild	Mild, Light	1033	Y
Burtonwood	Light Mild	Mild, Light	1031.5
Darley	Light Mild	Mild, Light	1032	Y
Gale	Light Mild (XXX)	Mild, Light	1030
Greene King (Biggleswade)	KK	Mild, Light	1030.8
Hydes	Best Mild	Mild, Light	1034	Y
Ind Coope (Romford)	Mild	Mild, Light	1031
Lees	Mild	Mild, Light	1031
McMullen	AK	Mild, Light	1033
Morrell	Light Mild	Mild, Light	1031.6
Rayment	AK	Mild, Light	1031	Y
Taylor	Golden Best. Golden Mild, Light Mild or Bitter Ale	Mild, Light	1033.4	Y
Theakston (Masham)	Light Mild	Mild, Light	1032
Webster	Best Mild	Mild, Light	1033.8	Y
Welsh Brewers	PMA	Mild, Light	1033.2
Average			1032.61
Source:
1978 Good Beer Guide

I won't claim they were all great beers. The Greenalls ones were shit, obviously. But most were at least decent. When looked after properly and in decent condition. And there was the rub. As Mild sales fell, and casks sat around too long, there was inevitably a fair bit of vinegar in pub situations. Which undoubtedly hastened Mild's demise.