Before all others there was Jack.

(John Holl, please forgive me for stealing the title of this post from you! It was just too great to pass up. http://www.craftbeer.com/featured-brewery/new-albion-brewing.)

Jack McAuliffe started the first micro-brewery, New Albion, in 1976. That’s a statement I’ve made a few times over the past few days anticipating Jack’s visit and yet some folks have rightfully asked me, “where does Fritz Maytag and Anchor Brewing fit into this and why isn’t Anchor considered the first microbrewery?” Fritz Maytag purchased the Anchor Brewing Company in 1966 while Jack McAuliffe started New Albion in 1976.

It’s a great question and very much deserving of an answer. Why isn’t Fritz Maytag regarded as the first?

The distinction to me is that Jack McAuliffe built a new brewery from the ground up with the intent of brewing high quality, “craft” beers. Anchor Brewing was pre-existing, “macro” style brewery that was making what many people considered to be not very good beer. The “modern” Anchor Brewery didn’t actually open until 1979, 3 years after New Albion opened in 1976.

Jack took the idea of making great beer and started New Albion from scratch. And in the 1970′s, there was no place to go and order a small brewery or the parts and pieces for it. Equipment suppliers were suited to helping large brewery concerns. In the early 1970′s that was all that existed. So Jack made do with whatever parts and pieces he could find and worked with experts in biology, chemistry and fermentation to figure out how to make the process work in a fairly small (micro) environment. Then he built the brewery, largely with his own hands and set out making great beers.

But Fritz was out on the street in the 1960′s peddling his newly acquired Anchor beer to bars and restaurants around San Francisco. In many cases, he couldn’t make a sale to store owners that looked down on Anchor beer. Fritz soon realized that many of the beers that Anchor was brewing in the 1960′s just weren’t that good. To Fritz’ credit, he didn’t disagree or give up, he set out to make his beers better and started the process of experimenting with new recipes and new beers that would set his brand apart from the others.

Fritz Maytag deserves nothing but respect and accolades for what he contributed to the beer world. He came to the floundering Anchor Brewery, bought it and eventually turned the quality of the beer around 180 degrees.  Jack McAuliffe would be the first to cite Fritz Maytag as an inspiration. Even before he opened New Albion, Jack was sampling and loving some of the beers that Fritz was already making at the old Anchor Brewery. So even though he didn’t build the first micro-brewery, Fritz was very much an influence on Jack, New Albion and the modern craft beer movement.

Unfortunately, the economics weren’t on New Albion’s side. As Jack had to figure most everything out from square one he didn’t have the benefit of the experience and supplies that modern micro-brewers have, so New Albion went of business in 1982 despite having gained a reputation for superior quality.

In the end, or perhaps the beginning in this case, Fritz took a struggling brewery and recognized it’s faults, eventually making great beer. Jack McAuliffe designed a brewery from the ground up to make great beer at a time when he had to improvise almost every piece of equipment and process at New Albion because there just wasn’t anyplace he could go to buy parts and pieces for small brewery “off the shelf.” It just had never been done that way before.

If you want to read a great story about Jack McAuliffe, I’d love to write another one for you but I’d serve you better to refer you to our friend John Holl, a real writer who knows beer and who has penned a great piece about Jack that appears on the Brewers Association website here – http://www.craftbeer.com/featured-brewery/new-albion-brewing.