beer, new york

We don’t have much patience for blue laws–prohibition ended 80 years ago, yo.  So we raise our glass every time a previously dry county or city goes “wet.” The latest to do so: New Albany, Mississippi, birthplace of the great William Faulkner.

According to this story in the Times, one-third of Mississippi counties are still dry, including, until recently, Union County, home of New Albany. Fifty years ago, Faulkner, apparently, led the charge to legalize beer in his adopted hometown of Oxford, 30 miles away, but failed.

“Yours for a freer Oxford,” wrote Faulkner, who had a long history of drinking binges, “where publicans can be law-abiding publicans six days a week and ministers of God can be ministers of God all seven days in the week.”

The attack made its way to The New Yorker, where it was published and described by editors as “the clearest and most concise prose” that Faulkner had ever written. The ordinance failed anyway.

Today, beer can legally be sold in Oxford, but only by the case, and weirdly, only warm. This, we suppose, is the beer equivalent of the Brady law–you don’t want folks buying a handgun in the heat of passion, nor, apparently, do you want them buying beer when they are actually thirsty. The new ordinance in New Albany, however, is saner. Town aldermen shot down attempts by church groups to prevent the sale of beer by the bottle, or refrigerated, or on Sundays (hallelujah).

At least one member of the blue-haired demographic thinks it is high time.

And that is fine with Marjorie Livingston, an 85-year-old retired teacher who volunteers at the Union County museum. She says she knows good and well that quite a few churchgoers drink, that some of the people who are going on and on about protecting the children enjoy going to Tupelo for a margarita every now and then.

“It’s a mixture of hypocrisy and ignorance, with maybe a little stupidity thrown in,” Ms. Livingston said.

I know Punxsutawney Phil saw his shadow. That supposedly dooms us all to four more months of winter or whatever.  But this is Beer, New York, not Beer, Pennsylvania. I’m going to side with Staten Island Chuck who was shadow-less earlier this week and “declared winter will be over in two weeks” according to this story out of his home burough.

So with winter practically over, it’s time to start drinking spring seasonals, and I’ll start with the offering from the notoriously weird Magic Hat Brewing Company in South Burlington, Vermont.

Magic Hat calls its spring beer Vinyl Lager. Clearly the Magic Hat people intend to confuse us since this beer neither contains vinyl nor meets any traditional definition of a lager. (If you doubt any of the above statements, check out this video animation Magic Hat made to celebrate this beer which includes a bottle of it miraculously sprouting a bouquet of wildflowers.)

Confusion aside, the vinyl lager pours a deep copper color and tastes like a hearty amber ale at 5.1 percent alcohol. I can totally picture sipping this beer some nippy night while playing cards next to a fireplace. Given that this beer’s made to accompany a Vermont spring, that actually makes sense.

Kudos to the St. Louis Post-Dispatch (a former stomping ground, albeit briefly) for this story and photo about Donald Roussin, a Maryland Heights, Missouri man who has  transformed his home into a beer can museum.

With 10,000 brewery collectibles — cans, neon signs, bottles, glass and a whole lot more — displayed, beer is represented everywhere in Roussin’s home. He even bought the house because its 18-foot cathedral ceilings offered more display space and the reinforced beams let him safely hang his heavier beer signs.

The story also introduced us to the Brewery Collectibles Club of America an organization dedicated to the buying and selling of beer cans. (Who knew?) Turns out January marks the 75th anniversary of the can. Back in 1935, the G. Krueger Brewing Company sold the first canned beer in Richmond, Virginia.

We especially dig the photo by Huy Mach. According to the caption, it is a panoramic image composed of three photos taken with a fish-eye lens. Who knew 8,500 empty beer cans could look so good?

-BNY

“Give strong drink unto him that is ready to perish, and wine unto those that be of heavy hearts. Let him drink, and forget his poverty and remember his misery no more.” Proverbs 31:6-7

*Actually, there is no mention of beer in the good book, but given the history of barley cultivation in the biblical Middle East, its possible that the “strong drink” alluded to here is beer.