Reginal Beer back in the day

[Ruffinogold]

The first beer I had , I was probably 4 or 5 . My mother is half German and when we went to shady lake NJ to visit that side of her family [ her mother was from Germany ] , it was a good time . The guys drank beer on the deck of the cabin . Underneath the deck was the keg . Being a little kid , when their mugs got empty , my job was to refill the mugs at the keg and bring it back up . The Germans encouraged drinking beer so I got to drink when I refilled , lol .

I dont drink beer much any more for some reason .. I think because its a lot of liquid to drink . When I was younger , I could drink some beer man [ hell , Id drink anything ] . These days Ill drink 1 and im full . But the 1 beer i do drink ... tastes really good .

Anyway .. fast forward to early teens

When I first started dabbling in drinking beer , some of the reginal beers in my neck of the woods were still around but not for long . The national beer brands really started kicking ass by late 70s and 80 and I think a good number of reginal brands bit the dust around then .... which is a bummer

The ones I recall having were ... Schaefer , Ballentine and Rheingold . I dont know if Genne Cream ale and 12 horse ale were national or just regional . I wasnt aware at that time that they made other products . I think in the 80's that the smaller brew companies were trying to compete with the big national brands because I believe I tried beers from other regions but they didnt last long . I mean , I had Hamms .. I dont think Hamms was brewed in my neck of the woods but it showed up for a time . Blatz was another that showed up and Im guessing it was regional somewhere and was trying to go national [ ? ] ... I was familiar with the NY , NJ and Pa stuff but other stuff came and went or maybe I moved , so maybe I went and they stayed ?. I didnt have a Stroh until I got back to Florida , which would have been in the midish 80's . I went from Jersey to Florida [ back a forth a few times in those 2 decades ]

I know the rage has been " craft " beers for a while and I dont find it interesting . These regional beers maybe werent off the chart but they were truly regional and they had a place in an area before everyone got bombarded by over commercialization and watering down [ imho ] , which is what the national stuff tasted like ... Schaefer was really damn good

What beer to you remember being reginal in your area and maybe which other ones came along from somewhere else .

Im curious because Im sure you guys will mention a brand and itll kick in a memory for me . Hell , I had to really dig down in memory to remember Blatz .. lol . I dont remember if i liked blatz or not , just that I drank it . I think I thought Hamms was good but Im not sure

[Kevin Keith]

No regional beers in West Texas. The only two beers I remember anybody ever drinking were Coors Banquet and Budweiser. I know there were a few others thrown in there. I do remember the Mexican beer Carta Blanca being pretty popular.

[Citizen B]

The only New England beer I can think of is Narragansett out of Rhode Island. The brand has since been revived and it is still proudly brewed in Rhode Island. Dr. Seuss did the advertising back in the day before he wrote children's books.

Connecticut didn't have a local beer when I was growing up. Nutmeg breweries went the way of the blacksmith and the buggy whip long before my time.

[Citizen B]

Maybe someone could buy a vowel and put an o in the title of this thread's title. It might get more traction.

I know it's driving me nuts. I don't even know what reginal beer is.

[Citizen B]

Thank you. That is exactly what was bothering me. Whoever did this, a tip of my fedora in our direction.

[Ruffinogold]

Maybe someone could buy a vowel and put an o in the title of this thread's title. It might get more traction.

I know it's driving me nuts. I don't even know what reginal beer is.

RegiOnal beers were beers that were distributed within a certain region , like say the south east . Remember when the numb nuts were making a thing about getting coors in their state back in the day . That was because it was regional and then went national

[Citizen B]

RegiOnal beers were beers that were distributed within a certain region , like say the south east . Remember when the numb nuts were making a thing about getting coors in their state back in the day . That was because it was regional and then went national

I hear they made a movie about it.

The boys are thirsty in Atlanta and the beer was in Texarkana. The Bandit and Snowman had to do what people said couldn't be done.

[Kevin Keith]

Huh. I guess Coors was regional then. Big region!

[Ruffinogold]

Huh. I guess Coors was regional then. Big region!

Yeah .For example it wasnt in Florida or Jersey or anywhere in between for some time . I think it was 80's when it went national . Some of the beers I mentioned were pretty much distributed along most of the east coast and inward a bit

There were all kinds back in our day and many more earlier than our day . Way back , I think smaller brewers merged in order to get brands regional . Many of those we've never seen ..... unless youre real real freaking old . I read a thing once about it and it was pretty interesting

Part of the reason I dig Straub beer is because they are still regional and seem to have it together . Hell , they still collect their bottles and wash and reuse them for x amount of time. Their Lager is delicious . Ive not had their Amber , though Id like to ... I bet its really good

Check out their site ..
https://straubbeer.com/our-beers/

[Citizen B]

Huh. I guess Coors was regional then. Big region!

I think it was limited to states that didn't have the Missippi River running through them. This is ancient history so I may be misremembering. I remember when Coors was finally available in stores and bars on the East Coast. Most people I knew at the time found this event to be much ado about nothing.

Coors had its cachet as a forbidden brew back in the day, when I was growing up. Now it is nothing special because it is everywhere.