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United States 35,826,098 barrels 58,546,111 barrels New England States 2,719,083 " 3,704,968 "

BREWING IN NEW YORK.

While the exact date of the beginning of brewing as a distinct calling cannot be ascertained, there is an abundance of historical evidence that among the very earliest acts of the Colonial governments, those tending to encourage the establishment of public breweries were deemed of the greatest importance. It is no less certain that whenever such encouragement did not sufficiently stimulate private enterprise to bring about the desired end, or when other reasons made it desirable, the rulers of some of the Colonial settlements seized upon this source of income themselves or granted monopolies to those private persons who intended to establish breweries. Thus Van Twiller, Governor of New Netherland from 1633 to 1638, erected a brewery on the West India Company's farm, which extended north from what is now Wall Street to Hudson Street, and the Patroon of Rensselaerwyck established a brewery at Beverwyck , reserving to himself the exclusive privilege of supplying all licensed retailers.

As this Director Van Twiller, mentioned above, is reputed to have been a hard drinker, ever intent on finding or creating a suitable occasion for indulging in his weakness, it is not hazardous to surmise that in erecting a brewery, he consulted his own tastes quite as much as the needs of his little community. His example is said to have influenced the drinking habits of the colonists to such an extent that drunkenness became a very common occurrence in the community. Captain De Vries narrates a number of incidents illustrating the weakness of Van Twiller, and among them is one which appears to deserve a place in this little sketch. Cornelius Van Voorst, the stem from which grew a numerous family famous in Manhattan and Jersey annals, was the superintendent of the colony of Pavonia, established by Pauwn. He was a man of hospitable inclinations, and had just imported a hogshead of Bordeaux wine. The rumor of its excellent quality reached the ears of Director-General Van Twiller, who, in company with Dominie Bogardus and Captain De Vries, paid the superintendent a visit by means of a rowboat. Van Voorst received the representatives of Church, State and Navy with a princely welcome. The cask was broached and the contents approved. After some hard drinking, a furious dispute about a recent murder arose between the host, the Governor and the Dominie. De Vries, the man of war, in this instance proved to be a man of peace, for by the exercise of his mediation and more claret, a truce was finally effected and "they parted good friends." This is not the dull ending, but merely the prelude to something more brilliant. Just as his guests were entering their boat to depart, Van Voorst, to show his good will, caused a swivel, which was fixed on a pillar near the house, to be fired. It was a fine salute, but a piece of wadding, falling on the Van Voorst mansion, set fire to the roof. It was impossible to check the flames and the house was burned to the ground, presumably destroying the hogshead of wine.

The business of the tapster necessarily preceded that of the brewer; for before the colonists could raise a crop of the cereals necessary for brewing--which they did, by the way, according to Isaac Jogues' description of Novum Belgium, in the very first year after their settlement--they had to depend upon the supply of liquors shipped to them from the mother country; and, from all accounts, we learn that the quantities thus imported were very large and, to modern minds, entirely out of proportion to the very scant population of the colony. In the earliest times, the condition and surroundings of the colonists were such that all available means of subsistence had to be treated very much like common property. Thus the West India Company undertook, at first, to furnish the settlers with what they absolutely needed for their sustenance,--the understanding being that the value of goods so furnished must be returned by the borrower as soon as the product of his labor enabled him to do so. This accounts for the fact that the first taproom on Manhattan Island was located in the first warehouse erected by Minuet, then Governor of New Netherland .

The number of tapsters, under Van Twiller's administration, increased rapidly; but there is no evidence that brewing kept pace with this growth--probably because the importation of wines and liquors from the mother country still sufficed to satisfy the demand. When, however, in the first year of his administration , Governor Kieft forbade the retailing of wines and spirits by the tapsters the brewing trade expanded to such an extent that a few years later an excise upon its product yielded a considerable revenue. From this time onward, brewing and retailing formed the subjects of frequent legislation both in New Netherland and in the New England colonies. The lawmakers not only regulated and taxed the manufacture and sale, but they also prescribed minutely the quality and price of beer, the time when, and circumstances under which, it could be sold; the duties of the tapster and the obligations of the drinker. Kieft forbade the tapping of beer during divine service and after a certain hour at night; and, in order to remind the burghers and tapsters of the latter inhibition, he caused the town bell to be rung--an imitation of the old European custom of announcing the hour for retiring. His object in introducing the curfew was probably not confined to these things; it is quite likely that he intended thus to force upon the honest Dutch burghers the conviction that a man of strong will had come to assume the powers and functions which the licentious Van Twiller had permitted to be disregarded. Doubtless Kieft honestly endeavored to correct the evils which had grown up under his predecessor's rule; but his motives were probably not always of a purely moral character. In forbidding the retailing of wine and confining its sale to the Company's warehouse--"where," as he stated in his proclamation, "it could be obtained in moderate quantities and at a fair price"--he intended no doubt to create for himself a monopoly of this traffic; and in establishing a distillery on Staten Island, the first in New Netherland, he very likely sought to enlarge the scope of his monopoly. Fortunately, brewing had by this time grown too strong as an independent enterprise to be absorbed by the Company in this singularly arbitrary manner. It had become a favorite occupation, as a local historian justly says; and many of the best and most respected citizens engaged in it.

The old German night-watchman's hourly song began with the announcement of the hour of the night and the admonition to guard fire and light.

Naturally enough, the rapid growth of brewing suggested to Governor Kieft the expediency of levying a tax upon beer, and he imposed this all the more readily because, in consequence of the Indian War which he had provoked by a "shocking massacre of savages," the treasury was totally depleted. In 1644, he levied a tax of three guilders upon every tun of beer manufactured by a brewer, and of one florin upon every tun brewed by private citizens for their own use. Aware that the imposition of this or any other tax without the consent of the "Eight Men"--a sort of assembly representing the people--would meet with little favor, he endeavored to propitiate the brewers by permitting them to sell beer to tapsters at twenty florins per tun, an increase over the old price almost covering the amount of the tax. The brewers, nevertheless, stoutly refused to pay the excise, and based their refusal upon the ground that the tax was imposed against the will of the representatives of the people and, therefore, contrary to what they conceived to be an inalienable right of every burgher. While their opposition to a government without the consent of the governed may not have been very clearly defined, the stout burghers of the colony fully understood that taxation without the consent of the taxed was an absolute wrong.

The best historians accord in the opinion that the attitude of the brewers, at that stage of the political development of the Colonies, deserves the utmost praise and reflects all the more credit upon them, because the inducements held out to them by Kieft in the form of a permission to increase the price of their product, might have prompted them to yield, if they had valued their profits more than the political rights of their fellow citizens. The historian O'Callaghan, in his History of New Netherland, expresses this view in these words: "Kieft had no idea of being thwarted by such constitutional scruples. Judgment was given against the brewers, and thus another victory was achieved in New Netherland over popular rights."

In all likelihood, the brewers expected that the protest which the Eight Men had openly raised against the excise would enable them to maintain their refusal to pay; but while this expectation may have had the effect of inspiring them with a degree of temerity which would otherwise not have been aroused so readily, it detracts not a particle from the praiseworthiness of their action. At all events, if they calculated upon any leniency on Kieft's part, they reckoned without their host; for that arbitrary ruler not only disregarded the remonstrances of the Eight Men and insisted upon payment of the tax, but he even confiscated the whole stock of beer in the cellars of the recalcitrant brewers and gave it to the soldiers--partly as a prize and partly, no doubt, as an incentive to effective execution, on their part, in the event of a popular demonstration. The brewers lost their beer and their case, but they were lauded and they made a memorable bit of history as the champions of popular rights.

We may be permitted to digress a little in order to mention a few of the many Colonial brewers whose names are familiar to every New Yorker, even to this day. William Beekman, brewer, was successively schepen, burgomaster of New Amsterdam for nine years, vice-director of the Colony on the Delaware, sheriff at Esopus, alderman, and again sheriff under English dominion--holding office, with some interruption for forty years. He continued the brewery of George Holmes, built in 1654, and died in 1707 at the age of 84. Beekman Street is named after him, and also William Street. Peter W. Couwenhoven, brewer, was schepen in 1653 and 1654, and again in 1658-59 and 1661-63. Nicholas and Balthazar Bayard, brewers, held office between 1683 and 1687; former as alderman and mayor, and the latter as alderman. Petrus Rutger, brewer, was assistant alderman from 1730 to 1732. The Rutgers were a family of brewers. Jean Rutgers, their forefather, had a brewery in 1653, built probably earlier. Alice, daughter of Anthony Rutgers, married Leonard Lispenard, and one of the latter's sons owned extensive breweries. The name of Lispenard, says a local historian, is merged in the families of Stewart, Webb, Livingstone, Winthrop, etc. John DeForrest, brewer, was schepen in 1658. Jacob Kip, brewer, was schepen from 1659 to 1665, and again in 1673. His ancestors, the DeKypes, belonged to the oldest nobility of the Bretagne.

We may now close this very incomplete list of prominent Colonial brewers with the mention of one whose name is, and always has been, of uncommon interest to historians, seeing that he was the first white male born in New Netherland. Jean Vigne held the office of schepen during three terms. He followed the threefold occupation of brewer, miller and farmer, and owned a tract of land, the site of his brewery, near Watergate .

EXCISE IN NEW NETHERLAND.

We will now return to our narrative. At the time of the brewers' protest against the excise, the number of tapsters in New Amsterdam and the surrounding country was very large; but, singular as it may appear, there was but one tavern for the entertainment of strangers, and this a clumsy stone building which Kieft had caused to be erected at the Company's expense in 1642. In that patriarchal spirit which characterized all his acts, he assumed a close supervision over this primitive hotel, the patronage of which must have been all the more profitable because the Governor, to prevent the influx of runaway servants and culprits, had prohibited the entertainment of strangers by private families for more than one night without his permission. This stone tavern was subsequently enlarged and fitted up for use as a Stadthuis . During the remainder of his administration Kieft gave no further trouble to the brewers; but the tax continued to be collected.

When Kieft was recalled, and succeeded by Governor Stuyvesant, the abolition of the excise was asked for, but was peremptorily refused. The hope that the excise would be abolished had been raised by Kieft himself, who had promised the Eight Men that upon the arrival of his successor a change would be effected. Stuyvesant, however, had no such intentions; on the contrary, he at once imposed new taxes, inaugurated a system of excises and licenses, and introduced a number of innovations designed to bring the business under better control. Thus, he ordered the complete separation of brewing and tapping, forbidding brewers to retail and tapsters to brew beer. Unlike his predecessor, he desired an improvement in the accommodations for travellers, and therefore ordered that tapsters and tavern-keepers should build better houses for the entertainment of guests. But as the number of tapsters and spirit venders had already grown too large, he refused to license new places. Stuyvesant's own report shows that, in 1651 or thereabouts, nearly the just fourth of the City of New Amsterdam consisted of brandy-shops, tobacco or beer-houses. This was certainly an exaggerated statement; yet from all other evidences it must be inferred that the consumption of liquors was enormous. We find, at a fair calculation based on the two essential factors, viz.: amount of excise and population, that the tax paid for drink amounted to four guilders for every man, woman and child of the community.

To enforce all these new laws and ordinances, promulgated for the sole purpose of securing as nearly as possible the full amount of taxes due the exchequer, Stuyvesant appointed inspectors, gaugers and revenue supervisors. Nevertheless, either on account of his natural distrustfulness or because he wished to set a good example to his officers, he frequently visited and inspected the taverns himself to make sure that his laws were obeyed. Money still being scarce, he increased the excise again and again, without permitting the brewers to raise the price of their product, until the beer-drinkers loudly complained that with every increase of tax, the brewers made their beer "thinner and poorer." These complaints finally induced him to adjust the prices of beer in accordance with the increased cost of production, and to prescribe minutely the quality of the article.

It may interest the reader to learn that beer, in those days, was made either of malted barley, wheat or oats, and that whenever there was a scarcity of any of these cereals, the lawmakers usually forbade the malting of it. Here, as in the New England colonies, the law provided for three grades of beer: the first grade requiring six bushels of malt for every hogshead; the second, four bushels; the third, two bushels. Complaints about the quality of beer were sometimes investigated by a court composed of the schepens and burgomasters. In 1655, when one of the burgomasters and two of the schepens were brewers, this court, being engaged in the consideration of such a complaint, adjourned and personally sampled the beer in dispute; whereupon they gave judgment in accordance with their own evidence.

Before the administration of Stuyvesant, the Patroons regulated the liquor traffic in their own way. In Rensselaerwyck, the condition of affairs now became somewhat muddled, as will presently be shown, in consequence of the conflict of authority between the Patroon and the representatives of the Director of the Colony. The manner in which the Patroon first regulated the traffic was simple enough.

As we have already stated, he established a brewery with the exclusive privilege of supplying all licensed retailers with beer; but he permitted private individuals to brew whatever beer they needed for their own families. Subsequently, however, other brewers were licensed. In the dorp of Beverwyck--the present Albany--which had sprung up in the immediate neighborhood of Fort Orange, and, in fact, throughout the colony, permission to build houses, establish stores, factories, shops, beer-houses, etc., had to be obtained from the Commissaries to whom the government was entrusted. This permission had to be paid for in some instances, while in others it was given gratuitously.

As a rule, the license to brew beer for sale did not belong to the latter category; on the other hand, the fee for such license seems to have been very high. In 1647, Jean Labadie, formerly an assistant commissary, applied for permission to build a brewery, which was granted on his paying a yearly duty in the shape of beaver, amounting in value to about eighty dollars. Many other licenses had been granted since then, and the number of tapsters seems to have been very large; good reasons why the Court at Fort Orange, representing the Stuyvesant Government, should insist upon the payment of the tax.

The Patroon, however, frustrated the first attempt to collect the excise and issued a proclamation expressly forbidding the brewers and tapsters to pay any duties. The tapsters, of course, readily obeyed this order. Finally, Stuyvesant ordered the Court at Orange to arrest one of the refractory tapsters, named Ariensen, and send him to Manhattan. The clerk of this court, Johann De Decker, successfully carried out this order by a ruse. He invited the unsuspecting Ariensen to his house and detained him, in spite of the protests of Van Rensselaer and the "schout" of the colony, and notwithstanding the offer of the former to vouch for the appearance of the prisoner. Ariensen, although compelled for security's sake, to sleep in De Decker's bed and to be watched over by a servant, managed to escape and took refuge in the house of Van Rensselaer. De Decker pursued the fugitive with the intention of re-apprehending him, but was met by a body of armed men who appeared determined to use force of arms, if necessary, to prevent the officer from fulfilling his duty. Bloodshed would inevitably have followed an attempt to recapture Ariensen, and, to avoid this, the officer retired, reporting the failure of his mission to the Director and asking that more soldiers be sent with him, having "among them one or two who are not nice about taking hold of a man."

As was to be expected, Stuyvesant resorted to measures which soon rendered the Patroon amenable to law and order, and the revenues derived from tapsters alone rose, within one year, from an insignificant sum to 4,200 guilders, in 1657. Nothing noteworthy occurred thereafter during Dutch dominion.

Nicolls, the first English Governor of New Netherland, paid some attention to brewing. Among the laws which he submitted to the Assembly convened at Hempstead, and which are known as the Duke of York's Laws, was one providing that no person should be allowed to brew beer for sale without having "sufficient skill and knowledge in the art and mystery of brewing," and otherwise regulating the trade with a view to securing wholesome beverages. He also introduced the fee-feature into the license-system governing retailers. In his endeavor to conciliate the conquered Dutch burghers, he, however, refrained for a time from strictly enforcing this rule and other excise-regulations contemplated by his principal. It was not until 1670 that he gave peremptory orders for the collection of the excise.

The first regular brew-master was probably R.H. Vansoest, who came to Albany in 1635 to take charge of the Patroon's brewery.

From the date of the recovery of the Colony by the Dutch up to the second surrender to the English , the liquor traffic received but casual attention in New York; and for many years after the re-establishment of English supremacy, the annals of the Colony contain no indications of great progress in brewing.

In the succeeding chapters the further development of brewing in New York receives sufficient attention to justify our closing this chapter at this point so as to avoid useless repetitions, and to prevent the overtaxing of the reader's patience.

BREWING IN PENNSYLVANIA.

In New Castle and Delaware River the Duke of York's laws remained in force until 1682, when they were superseded by the acts passed by Penn's Assembly. William Penn introduced brewing into Pennsylvania at a very early date. He built a brewery near his house at Pennsbury, and all his acts and ordinances indicate a decided preference for malt liquors. It was under his fostering care that the "infant industry" prospered for a time and made Quaker beer quite famous.

To the excellent quality of this beer and the abundance of it may be attributed the fact that brewing had not, at that time, gained a foothold in West New Jersey, the colonists there drawing their supply from the Quaker brewers in the adjoining Colony. Deputy-Governor Gowen Laurie, one of the proprietors of West New Jersey, made an effort, in 1683, to have a brewer sent to him from England. A malt-house had already been established at Amboy, "but", wrote Laurie, "we want a brewer, and I wish thou wouldst send one to set up a brew-house." The Swedish settlements on the Delaware seem to have reaped a sufficient harvest from the vines which they had planted to secure them an ample supply of wine.

Not all beers, however, were of the kind referred to before. Neither domestic malt nor hops could be procured in sufficient quantities to supply so large a demand and as a consequence the colonists fell back upon the manufacture of what might be styled a new kind of mead. We have it on the assurance of Penn himself that "molasses when well boiled with sassafras or pine infused into it" makes a very tolerable drink.

Beer-drinkers probably preferred hops and malt, and when the short-sighted policy of the lawmakers imposed exorbitant duties upon imported hops and malt before enough of these materials could be raised at home, and at the same time fixed the price of domestic malt-beer and its quality at a rate which made the business unprofitable, brewing naturally declined, and in the logical course of things molasses was then transformed into rum or the latter article imported in the place of the former.

The evil effects of this policy must have become manifest almost instantaneously for as early as 1713 Governor Gordon deplores the decadence of brewing and the almost total discontinuance of the cultivation of hops and barley. After various futile experiments to remedy the evil the lawmakers in 1722 imposed a duty upon molasses, primarily to discourage the manufacture of rum, and enacted several laws designed to encourage the brewing of beer made of grain and of hops. One of the principal inducements was the entire separation of the sale of beer from the liquor traffic and the exaction of a very low license-fee from the keepers of ale-houses. The use in brewing of molasses, sugar or honey was absolutely forbidden, and both the brewers and the brewing tavern-keepers were compelled to give security for the faithful observance of the provisions of the act relating to permissible materials.

The law distinctly sets forth that one of its objects is to induce "the brewers to take special care to bring their beer and ale to the goodness and perfection which the same was formerly brought to, that so the reputation which then was obtained and is since lost, may be retrieved."

The same law directs that the proper officers in fixing the prices of commodities "shall allow higher prices than common to be taken for such beer and ale as shall excel in quality." Economically considered, the laws fixing the price as well as the quality of the commodity, frequently without regard to cost of raw material and labor and almost always without due consideration of the condition of crops and the market, was a serious error and the very text of the quoted Act seems to indicate that the lawmakers had begun to understand the far-reaching effect of this blunder.

Between the rum or molasses imported from the West Indies in the earlier periods and the subsequent spread of rural distillation, brewing had scarcely any chance of a healthy development; nevertheless, it continued to be practiced in the principal towns, particularly where the German element preponderated. It was an economic fallacy of the age that in grain-growing countries agriculture could not possibly prosper without the distillery--a fallacy which prevailed in the northern countries of Europe and could not but find universal approval during the pioneer period of a new country where the means of transportation were exceedingly scant. In the rural districts the number of stills increased in proportion to their remoteness from the centers of civilization and in some parts whiskey actually took the place of money as a medium of barter, just as in a previous period rum had been the main stay of foreign commerce.

In 1790 there were no less than 5,000 stills in operation in the State of Pennsylvania, that is to say, one still for every 86 of the population. Long before this period public attention had been directed by public writers and speakers to the temperate drinking-habits which prevailed in most of the German settlements, and naturally enough, on all such occasions, brewing was advocated as a means of promoting temperance.

In his "Account of the manners of the German inhabitants of Pennsylvania," Benjamin Rush dwells with particular emphasis upon the fact that these people, whom he praises for their probity, frugality, economy, love of liberty and country, commonly drink beer, wine and cider, and he makes this fact one of the principal arguments in favor of his famous temperance scheme. Many other writers then and thereafter coincided with him in this view; among them Tench Coxe who "considered it a fact strongly in favor of the industry, sobriety and tranquillity of Philadelphia that its breweries exceeded, in the quantity of their manufactured liquors, those of all the seaports of the United States."

This may seem all the more remarkable on account of the growth of the distilleries after the abolition of the first Federal tax on spirits, brought about in a measure by the Whiskey Rebellion; but it will not in any way appear astonishing, if the character of the population of that city be borne in mind.

Philadelphia beer had retained its reputation for excellent quality even during the era of free whiskey, when brewing throughout the country seemed to be in the last stages of hopeless decline; but it must not be supposed that in even this city of beer-drinkers the production kept anything like an equal pace with the increase of population.

Enough has already been said on this subject in the chapters on brewing in New England and more will be said in the two chapters on the decline of brewing and on the rise of lager beer to render unnecessary a more detailed account.

In 1810 there were in operation in Pennsylvania 48 breweries with an aggregate annual output amounting to 71,273 barrels; New York had only 42 breweries and an annual production of 66,896 barrels. The output of all the other States of the Union amounted to but 44,521 barrels. Pennsylvania remained in the lead during about 20 years, when it had to yield first place to New York. The marvellous growth of brewing in the West did not change the relative position of these two States in point of production, but it changed completely the status of the industry, as we shall presently show.

BREWING IN THE SOUTH.

In the Southern provinces, unfavorable soil and climate conspired with other unpropitious circumstances to exclude brewing almost entirely. Sporadic attempts to introduce it were quickly frustrated, no less by reason of a lack of suitable raw material than on account of a want of skilled brewers; and also, perhaps, because domestic spirits could be had more cheaply.

In Virginia, as early as 1652, one George Fletcher had obtained the exclusive right to "brew in wooden vessels, which none had experience in but himself;" but his product evidently found little favor, for we read no more of him or his wooden vessels.

From the instructions given to the governors of Virginia by the London Company and from other equally direct evidences, it is to be inferred that the repression of excesses in drinking, and the creation of agricultural conditions favoring the home-production of wine and beer were the two principal objects of the government's care. The latter project, for reasons already indicated, failed of realization.

A double discrimination is here made in favor of malt liquors, viz., one in explicit terms, permitting the sale of strong beer only, and an implied one in the clause which excludes debts for wines and strong waters from the list of obligations legally pleadable. The fact is that beer was considered an indispensable part of every regular meal.

Among the "staple commodities" sought to be encouraged by law, in 1658, we find hops and wine; the premium on the latter being ten thousands pounds of tobacco for "two tunne of wine" raised in any colonial vineyard.

The importation of English malt and malt liquors increased rapidly, because domestic brewing and malting remained in an unsatisfactory condition. Roger Beverly gives the following interesting description of the manufacture and use of drinks at about this time:

In 1748, the Sabbath question first entered into legislation on the liquor traffic. No mention is made of the subject in any of the preceding acts, not even in those passed during the Cromwellian reign, when the Puritan idea, that the State should by legislative enactment enforce complete inactivity and abandonment to spiritual contemplation on Sunday, had gained popular favor. The act passed in that year contained the following clauses referring to the Sabbath:

... "If any ordinary-keeper shall in his house permit unlawful gaming, or suffer any person or persons to tipple in his house, or drink any more than is necessary, on the Lord's day, or any other day set apart by public authority for religious worship, ... the court may disable such offender from keeping ordinary thereafter, until they shall think fit to grant him a new license, or may restore him to keep ordinary upon his former license, as they shall see cause."

In 1769 the cause of temperance achieved two signal successes; one consisting in the revocation of the import duty on beer, and the other in the renewal of legislation encouraging viticulture. The idea of fostering the manufacture of malt liquors found many advocates at this time, and there can be no doubt that many of the best Americans strove, by precept and example, to bring about a change of drinking habits, in the manner indicated, long before the passage of the two acts just cited.

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