Brown Ale

Now I'm back from my travels, I've been getting stuck into some research. Specifically, research for my book "Free!" Aiming to fill a Brown-Ale-sized hole in my knowledge. 

Trawling through the newspaper archive, I immediately got a couple of promising hits. Bottled beers clearly called Brown Ale from the early 1900s. What's even better, one of them is an advert from Fullers. From 1909.

Why is that such a good thing? Because I have their brewing records from 1910. Meaning I can match up the beers on the advert with the relevant brewing records. And, hey presto, I have my earliest Brown Ale brewing record. My only one from before WW I.

Let's start with the Fullers ad.

Fullers advert in the Acton Gazette - Friday 16 July 1909, page 4.

 Brown Ale appears as both a draught beer and one sold in crates of four bottles. The former is unusual. Usually Brown Ale was exclusively a bottled beer.

Here's that advert in handy table form:

Fullers Advertisement from 1909
beer	price per barrel	price (per gallon)	price (per doz) pint	size
XK Bitter Pale Ale	48	16
AK Light Bitter Ale	38	12.67
X Amber Mild Ale	38	12.67
H Brown Ale	38	12.67
Double Stout	56	18.67
Single Stout	46	15.33
Porter	38	12.67
Pale Ale			2s 9d
India Pale Ale			3s 9d
Nourishing Stout			2s 9d
Oatmeal Stout			2s 9d
Extra Stout			3s 9d
Pale Ale			1s 4d	crate of 4 quarts
Brown Ale			1s 4d	crate of 4 quarts
Stout			1s 4d	crate of 4 quarts
India Pale Ale			1s 10d	crate of 4 quarts
Extra Stout			1s 10d	crate of 4 quarts
Source:
Acton Gazette - Friday 16 July 1909, page 4.

And here are the beers from the brewing record.

Fullers beers in 1910
Beer	Style	OG	FG	ABV	App. Atten-uation	lbs hops/ qtr	hops lb/brl
X	Mild	1052.6	1014.7	5.01	72.08%	5.17	1.21
AK	Pale Ale	1044.9	1008.3	4.84	81.48%	7.29	1.43
PA	Pale Ale	1054.2	1012.2	5.55	77.49%	8.92	2.15
P	Porter	1048.6	1011.9	4.85	75.47%	6.64	1.28
BS	Stout	1069.5	1019.9	6.56	71.30%	6.64	1.84
BO	Strong Ale	1074.9	1024.4	6.68	67.44%	9.84	3.05
Source:
Fullers brewing record held at the brewery.

A couple of notes on the draught beers. XK from the advert is obviously PA in the brewing record. And both X and H must be derived from X in the brewing record. With H just being X coloured up darker at racking time.

And where does Single Stout come from? There's just Porter and one Stout in the brewing record. It has to be a blend of Porter and Stout. Based on the price, a 50-50 blend.

In the crate beers, Pale Ale must be AK, Brown Ale must be X and Stout must be Porter.

What does this tell us? That Brown Ale, even in its earliest days, could already just be a tweaked version of Mild Ale.