• Try only one style of beer from as many breweries as possible.
• Focus on a particular region.
• Visit the popular breweries not available in your area.
• Go to every brewery without a line. As the night goes on, this become more rare but it does happen.

Cow shoes used by Moonshiners in the Prohibition days to disguise their footprints, 1922

Alerted by the smell of a broken bottle of liquor,. Los Angeles, 1926

The earliest known photograph of men drinking beer. Edinburgh Ale, 1844

Dear Sirs: (letter to editor)

I was pleased to see the coverage of Jim Koch's visit to the Berkshires.  I am fortunate to have met Jim at a number of Master Brewer events over the years and he truly has a heart for innovation based upon a life of luck and hard work.  Jim chose to use Samuel Adams, our first recognizable founding father, as his flagship beer.  Samuel Adams is recognized as a true American hero and someone Massachusetts shall be eternally grateful for.  Another great founder of our Revolution, Mr. Christopher Gadsden, often called, "Samuel Adams of the South", is perhaps best known today for his creation of "Don't Tread on Me" rattlesnake flag, which was given to the first commander of the U.S. Navy.  Of these historic references, none had more impact on Jim Koch than the issue of Marriage.  Jim's beer story began, he tells us, after his divorce left him completely broke.  It was a story comparable to that of Samuel Adams, Christopher Gadsden, and Paul Revere, combined.   Today we look back to Jim's discoveries in the brewery and the history that changed American beer forever.  These individuals are the basis for leadership and clear innovation found in brewers today.  For example, in America, the notion that each micro-brewer has the freedom to do what we want and when we want is different than the traditional world view of beer.  In Germany, a traditional Rheinheitsgebot, or purity law, generates the accepted level that beer must achieve.  When that level of the law is not found, Germans erupt into a lack of understanding about American Beer.  Our Micro-Brewers, however, cannot find a reason to keep the Rheinheitsgebot and essentially give up the right to be considered for the best beers in the world.  The truly amazing thing about Jim Koch is that he has achieved the highest beer recognition in the world.  Now all that the Germans can say is Wow.  "Gesundheit".  This word means, "Health" and in my visits to Brau-Tech in Germany and coverage of world events of brewing, I continually give congratulations to Jim's leadership in brewery economics in America.  Today Jim's contributions include our historic Massachusetts even further.   In 2013, let us anticipate another level of American Gesundheit when he launches his Berkshire distilleries endeavor.
 
Mark Earl Dallmeyer
Healthy Remnants
Pittsfield,  MA 01201
413-329-7211