Let's Brew - 1944 William Younger Majority Ale

You can’t get much more special than this: a genuine Majority Ale. That is, a beer brewed on the birth of a member of the family, which would be drunk when said child reached 21, the age of majority.

What’s even more unusual, is that such an exceedingly strong beer was brewed during WW II, at a time when beer was generally pretty watery. Though Younger continued the tradition even beyond WW II, brewing Majority Ale until at least 1960. 

It was parti-gyled with No. 1, Younger’s strong Scotch Ale, but was a good bit stronger. Only 35 barrels were brewed, but for such a specific family brew, that’s actually quite a lot.

This was brew 1909

The only difference in ingredients between this and Younger’s Pale Ales is a type of malt simply described as “M”. Usually, I’d assume that meant mild malt. But the quantities Younger used of it were far too small for that to make any sense. Based on the beers it was used in, it must be some sort of coloured malt. I’ve randomly plumped for a dark crystal malt. I could be way wrong.

The hops were all Kent, from the 1942 and 1943 harvests.

It was brewed for someone whose initials were WSL. 16 dozen half pint bottles were filled from it on 21st January 1965, “Remainder used for filling up, + 1 firkin for reprocessing.”

1944 William Younger Majority Ale
pale malt	21.00 lb	71.79%
crystal malt 120 L	2.25 lb	7.69%
flaked barley	6.00 lb	20.51%
Fuggles 150 mins	4.00 oz
Fuggles 90 mins	4.00 oz
Fuggles 30 mins	4.00 oz
Goldings dry hops	1.00 oz
OG	1122
FG	1022
ABV	13.23
Apparent attenuation	81.97%
IBU	95
SRM	22
Mash at	153º F
Sparge at	160º F
Boil time	150 minutes
pitching temp	56.5º F
Yeast	WLP028 Edinburgh Ale