Retro Lager Chic

how many of these beers are in their prime vintage style tough?

 

My friend just reminded that his dad used to participate in the Saturday afternoon/evening horseshoe/beer drinking and he was a Ballentine drinker. Everybody else thought he was strange for drinking ale.

 

hey i was born in chicago but only lived there a few years of my early life ... lived all around the u.s.a and in canada, since . i've gotten over the bitter/I.P.A. thing and am back to enjoying simple moderately-sweet tasting lagers and ales ... life is too short for caustic/bitter beer ...

 

Anybody collect cans back in the 70's? My old man still gives me crap about that: "I can't believe all the crappy beer I drank for you". No mix 6ers back then. He survived it though.

 

I collected cans back then. The only time I remember my dad complaining was when he drank a Fosters Lager for the collection. He didn't much care for it. Busch was his beer to the grave. Wonder if then was now, would he take a Dreadnaught IPA for me? Of course he would. He's my dad. Cheers, dad!

 

During my Illinois youth we drank lots of Strohs, Busch , Bud , Hamms ( does anybody remember the mini-kegs they made = 24 cans) and when it hit Illinois, Olympia. Lot's of memories, many of them hazy.
I spent six years in St. Louis and consumed a small swimming pool of Bud Light, emphasis on the people hardly noticing the beer. Social circumstances still find me with a Bud Light in my hand, nursing it. It doesn't taste that bad, it just doesn't taste at all.
The one beer I have nostalgic thoughts though is Grain Belt. My Aunt & Uncle had a farm in South Dakota, and the only time I had it was when I'd visit. I was only able to drink up there once in high school, and a couple times in college still recall.

 

I tend to view the older lagers as a history lesson when I drink them. A few of them, I will admit I actually enjoy, gansette being the front runner. But on a recent trip out to Ohio I managed to score some little kings, some hudepohl (which I swear tastes just like yuengling) and some burger beer. Will I ever buy them again, most likely not. But I was happy I tried them. New York definitely has some interesting ones, and I find Genny bock to actually be a pretty solid beer. However for the guy up there who wanted to try the old Vienna, I happen to agree with its insulting nickname.

 

I collected cans and bottles in the 70's and still have a lot of them. I haven't looked at them in years and really don't know why I can't part with them.

 

I'd do a schmidts too.... my dad drank 1 every night w/ dinner!

 

man, I'd love a schmidts bottle from the 70's... (Dad passed away in the 80's... something I always associated w/ him) My local shop has a lovely vintage beer bottle collection on the wall probably spanning the 60's to the 70's....
is it wrong to have empty beer bottle envy?

 

ive tasted them all and honest to god there is no serious quality difference, you are tasting the label on the can, not the beer inside.

 

I like Pliny, FBS and Old Raspy as much as the next BA. I also drink AALs (High Life being a favorite). How I wish they would bring back Falstaff, like they did the Schlitz Gusto. Nothing wrong w/ a cold can or bottle of AAL. Bud Light was once called Budweiser Light , and I had the can. It looked a lot like the original Bud can. Also had a can of Jax, which we found stashed in the studs of a house made in the 50's that we tore down. Perfectly preserved by some thirsty carpenter.

 

Wait, you were trying to avoid the "hipster chic" and you went for "Gansett? Around my parts Gansett is the hipster drink of choice.

 

You bet, I do!

 

We used to buy Schmitty 16's for a buck a sixer, then it was brewed in Philly.

 

I think he means he's in it more for the beer than the scene.

Gansett has a really rich history and they produced some of the coolest old timey beer commercials I've ever seen. They also stopped brewing for a long while and avoided getting sold to Pabst/Miller, like most other retro brands, so they're one of a small handful of legit, independent retros.

I did a write up about them, if you're at all interested:

http://mynie.com/?p=120

 

Huh? Narragansett sold out to Falstaff in 1965. At the time, Falstaff was the #4 brewer in the country (larger than Miller or Coors).

The S&P Corporation (General/Lucky Lager) bought Falstaff the next decade and eventually purchased Pearl and Pabst, and then folded all their breweries/brands under the Pabst Brewing Co. name by the 1990's. Narragansett as such was also owned by and brewed by what had become Pabst, and was contracted brewed for Pabst at LaCrosse, WI (the Heileman-Stroh brewery by then by City) and by Miller in Milwaukee.

S&P/Pabst also brewed Narragansett at their own breweries including Olympia in WA, Pearl in San Antonio, TX and Falstaff in Ft. Wayne, IN among probably others, after they closed the RI brewery around 1980.

Pabst eventually sold the rights to the moribund "Narragansett" label to the former owner of the Nantucket Nectars beverage company in 2005.

 

I understood what he was saying, just making a tongue in cheek comment. 'Gansett does have a rich history and I am happy supporting them. Looks like a good write up, I will read when I've got a spare moment. Cheers!

 

Ahh... I was very wrong, then. But they're still independent now?