Mild ascendant in 1930's Bolton

Mass Observation. We owe them a great debt. Now I can see exactly how much beer a backstreet Bolton beerhouse was selling in the 1930's. It's something I'd dreamt of discovering for decades.

"We tried the barmen. One, in a typical, small corner beerhouse, said that their sales of bottled beer were about a third of those of draught beer, and gave the following figures:

AVERAGE SALES PER WEEK
2.5 barrels of mild.
16 doz. of bottled ale.
12 doz. of Guiness.
4 doz. small bottles stout.
1 doz. minerals.

. . . . .

YEAR'S TOTAL,  139 barrels [of Mild]."
"The Pub and the People" by Mass Observation, 1943 (reprinted 1987), page 32.

The first thought that strikes me, much like a kipper in the face, is: "How on earth could anyone live from that tiny turnover?". Let's work out, shall we, exactly how much markup the landlord would have made on that level of sales. Assuming the Guinness and bottled Ale were pints, I make that 7,344 gallons of beer sold in a year. It breaks down like this:

Beer	units sold	unit size (gallons)	gallons sold	price per unit	% profit	unit profit (pence)	total profit (pence)	total profit (pounds)	% of beer sales
Mild	139	36	5,004	5	27	1.35	54,043.2	225.18	68.14%
bottled ale	832	1.5	1,248	7.5	30	2.25	22,464.0	93.6	16.99%
Guinness	624	1.5	936	11	30	3.3	24,710.4	102.96	12.75%
small bottles stout	208	0.75	156	4.5	30	1.35	1,684.8	7.02	2.12%
total			7,344				102,902.4	428.76

The unit prices are taken from other parts of "The Pub and the People", except for Guinness. I've guestimated the price based on a later Barclay Perkins price list. There Guinness was about 50% more expensive than standard bottled beer. The percentage profit comes from "The Brewers' Journal 1940" page 555, which gives the profit margin on various drinks in an average London pub before and after the outbreak of war.

So a little over 400 quid a year in gross profit. Or eight pounds 5 shillings a week. That's without rent, wages, coal and every other expense. To put this into context, the average wage in Bolton at the time was £1 12s a week, for bar staff £1 5s, for a head barman in a large pub, £3. I think it's clear that the landlord of that beerhouse couldn't have been making much more than the average wage. Unless he had free labour which was, for those with a large family, sometimes the case.

Contrast that with a large, fully-licensed, town-centre pub:

"Town centre pub, landlord takes observer into cellar, to reckon up sales by inspection of empties. This is the landlord's estimate.

Mild. 7 loads a week. (A load is 36 gallon barrel.)
Bitter. 1 load.
Old. 2 quarter loads.
Blue Label and Oatmeal stout. 150-200 bottles.
Guinness. "Very poor selling."
Whiskey. 7 or 8 to 10 bottles.
Gin. 4 bottles.
Rum. 4 bottles. (Sold in bottle—"Mostly a sailor and an old woman".)
Port. 8 bottles.
Sherry. 9 bottles. "I drink a lot myself."

This is a pub with a rather special type of custom. It is not used by the ordinary working class pub-goer and many women non-beer drinkers go there. Relatively more spirits are drunk here than in almost any other local pub. Yet to approximately 330 gallons of beer only 35 bottles of wine and spirits are drunk. That is over 5,000 gills to between five and six hundred drinks of wine and spirits. (18-20 single whiskeys are got from a bottle, and about 12 glasses of wine.) That is, the chances are ten to one that anyone will order not-beer in this pub."
"The Pub and the People" by Mass Observation, 1943 (reprinted 1987), page 49.

Let's break those beer sales down:

Beer	units sold	unit size (gallons)	gallons sold	% of beer sales
Mild	7	36	252	76.13%
Bitter	1	36	36	10.88%
Old	0.5	36	18	5.44%
Blue Label and Oatmeal stout	200	0.125	25	7.55%
total			331

A very different type of pub to the corner beerhouse. Yet, oddly enough, the percentage of beer sales that were Mild was higher: 76% as opposed to 68%. Not sure how you explain that one. Perhaps it's that customers with more cash drank spirits in the town-centre pub, but bottled beer in the beerhouse.

This stuff fascinates me. Probably because it's the closest you can get to time travel without harnessing the awesome might of a black hole.

Oat Ale II

I've still not finished with Oat Ale. Here are a few more quotes on the topic.

"Oats yield, on an average, eight pounds of meal for fourteen pounds of the grain. Oats have been used to some extent for the purpose of making malt, and oat ale is commended by Mr Mowbray as a pleasant summer drink. In former days, a drink called mum was manufactured for sale, in the preparation of which oatmeal was employed. English Geneva, or gin, is made of spirit obtained from oats and barley or malt, rectified or distilled, with the addition of juniper berries, oil of turpentine, &c. One hundred pounds of oatmeal will yield by distillation thirty-six pounds of spirits."
"A Treatise on Food and Diet: With Observations on the Dietetical Regimen suited for Disordered States of the Digestive Organs" by Jonathan Pereira, 1843, page 156.

Here's a German beer - it sounds a bit like a type of Broyhan - which is likened to British Oat Ale.

"MINDEN is noted for a peculiar Sort of Beer, greatly esteemed in other Parts of Germany: I cannot however say, it had very much my Approbation. It is a Sort of small pale Beer, something like our Oat-Ale, not unpleasant in the Taste 5 a Kind of dulce -piccante (between Sweet and Sour -,) But what disgusted me was, that being drawn and brought us in transparent Bottles, I soon discover'd a muddy Settlement, above an Inch thick, at the Bottom."
"The German Spy: Or, Familiar Letters from a Gentleman on His Travels Thro' Germany, to his Friend in England" by Thomas Lediard, 1740, page 45.

It seems it was Oat Ale was also popular in Russia.

"The Muscovites make an ale or drink of oats, which is of so hot a nature, and so strong, that it intoxicates sooner than the richest wine."
"History of Cultivated Vegetables: Comprising Their Botanical, Medicinal, Edible, and Chemical Qualities; Natural History; and Relation to Art, Science and Commerce" by Henry Phillips, 1822, page 13.

By the mid-1800's it seems Oats were no longer used in brewing.

"The principal demand for oats in Great Britain is for horses. Its use for bread is chiefly confined to the northern districts. Meal is employed also for various domestic purposes, feeding pigs, dogs, &c.; and it has been used in brewing ale, and in the malt distilleries ; but for this purpose its value is much inferior to that of barley."
"The Farmer's Encyclopædia, and Dictionary of Rural Affairs" by Cuthbert William Johnson, 1844, page 856.

In the Middle Ages, it appears that oats were the main brewing grain in Scotland.

"Oats, wheat, barley, pease and beans, were all raised in tolerable abundance. Of these by far the most prevalent crop was oats. It furnished the bread of the lower classes; and the ale which they drank was brewed from malt made of this grain. In the innumerable mills which are mentioned in the Cartularies, great quantities of oats were ground into meal; and at the various malt-kilns and breweries, which we find attached throughout the same records to the hamlets and villages, equally large proportions of oats were reduced into malt and brewed into ale. In the Wardrobe Accounts of Edward the First for the years 1299 and 1300, large quantities of oat malt, furnished to his different garrisons in Scotland, form some of the principal items of expenditure. In the same interesting and authentic record we find that Edward's cavalry, in their return from Galloway, in September 1300, destroyed, in their march through the fields, eighty acres of oats upon the property of William de Carlisle, at Dornock, in compensation for which the king allowed him two butts of wine. It appears in the same series of accounts that Edward bought his oats, and oat malt to be brewed for the army, at various rates, extending from twentypence to three shillings per quarter. From the multitudes of brew-houses with which every division of the kingdom appears to have been studded, from the royal manufactories of ale down to those in the towns, burghs, baronies, and villages, it is evident that this beverage must have been consumed in great quantities."
"History of Scotland 1149-1603" by Patrick Fraser Tytler, 1841, page 181
by Patrick Fraser Tytler, 1841.

In Lancashire - where the climate wasn't great for wheat or barley - oat malt was also commonly used for brewing.

"The quantity of "ote malte" used in Lord Derby's household in 1563 was larger than that of barley, although of an inferior quality and price, which is not favourable to the agricultural progress of Lancashire. Oat malt was rather more than a guinea a quarter (£1. 1s. 4d.), which was exactly the price of wheat in Craven in 1572, when malt made from oats was stated to be only eight shillings a quarter. This oat beer was obviously of an ordinary description, and probably for the use of the lower servants and boys; but in the best ale a certain proportion of oat malt and ground wheat was added to the barley malt, as the general rule, and the quantity of hops seems to have been very different to the modern usage, so that it would not be described as " bitter from envy, and, from weakness, pale." The dry and chilly constitutions of the servants, few of whom, it may be presumed, were born under the influence of Aquarius, that watery sign, were carefully protected against any deterioration in the quality of the beer, and the favourite beverage brewed in the time of Earl Edward was remembered with evident satisfaction by the toping Capulets of the household long after his death."
"Remains, Historical and Literary, Connected with the Palatine Counties of Lancaster and Chester" by Chetham Society, 1853, page x.

Ireland, too, must at one time have used its fair share of oats in brewing. This is part of an Act of Parliament regulating brewiong in Ireland.

"XI. And be it further enacted, That from and after Ten Days after the passing of this Act, every Person or Рersons licensed to brew as aforesaid, shall in like Manner enter and register in the Excise Office of the District, every Store Room and Place in which Oats shall or may at any Time be deposited, and that no such Store Room or Place shall be adjoining to or connected with, or be open by means of any Door or Doorway immediately to the Place where any Malt shall be wetted or mashed, or any Worts shall he boiled, cooled, or hopped; and any Oats which shall be found in the Possession of any such Person or Persons, in any other Place than a Store or Place so registered, shall be forfeited and may be seized; and such Person or Persons in whose Custody, Store or Possession, such Oats shall be found, shall for every such Offence forfeit the Sum of One hundred Pounds."
“Statutes of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland, 49 George III. 1809” page 123. An Act for improving the Quality of Beer in Ireland, by further preventing the Use of unmalted Corn, or of any deleterious or unwholesome Ingredients therein, and for the better securing the Collection of the Malt Duties in Ireland. [3d June 1809.]

I've kicked oats and Oat Ale just about unconscious. Perhaps it's time to find a new victim. What about Berliner Weisse?