Where and why we need a monument to victory over the prohibitionists.

Over at my civic affairs blog, I have a fairly good idea. I think it's one of the best ideas I've had in a while. Here's the link:

ON THE AVENUES: Ice Cold WCTU (A Modest Proposal).

... The grand opening can be preceded by a community-wide art contest, in which local artists riff on a theme of fundamentalist zealotry. For the occasion, we might clear the former dining room of furniture and display the art there. Behind the art, through the window, lies the brewery, and if those machines kill fascists, surely they eradicate prohibitionists as well.

Indie craft consciousness in downtown New Albany on Saturday, September 22.

(Previously published at NA Confidential)

NABC’s contribution to the festivities of Louisville Craft Beer Week surely will strike some observers as atypical.

That’s because “typical” in craft beer is in desperate need of redefinition, and tilting at windmills like these is what gets me out of bed in the morning.

On Saturday, September 22, we’ll be breaking in Bank Street Brewhouse’s recently approved, (yet far from completed) former patio, called the WCTU Reading Room, and our new “biergarten,” known as Lloyd’s Landing. We’ll be pouring local and regional beers, ciders, meads and even some wines. We’ll be acting as the de facto adult beverage annex to the first-ever New Albany Indie Fest, and just for the fun of it, hosting a Kentucky bourbon tasting and dinner.

I’m calling it the Southern Indiana Craft Beer Showcase, but I might have simplified matters by omitting the word “beer.” It’s the main component, but not the only one. My ideological motivation is two-fold.

To make a point about what I view as overlapping circles of interest, from local to metro, from regional to national, and all the way to international.

To allow the people closest to me to experience tastes of what can be done by local producers and purveyors, not just of beer, but also of other libations that fuel my personal world.

I’ve always counseled event organizers to begin by tailoring their planned gatherings to those potential attendees closest in proximity, and only then widening the scope to entice those from a distance.

A good example is the renowned institution of the Beer Dinner. It has been my experience that the marvels of the “visiting” beer team alone generally will not sell the required number of seats. Rather, the regulars who already enjoy a chef’s menu and regimen invariably compose the biggest bloc of diners, and if they have a particular interest in the brewery or beers being paired, it serves to enhance a spark previously lit.

In like fashion, I want our Showcase event to be about this extended community, and to help explain the aspects of “buying local” that I personally believe are the most important: Shifting one’s personal discretionary spending from multinational to local, and while doing so, visualizing the way these circles touch.

Aeppeltroew ciders are made in Wisconsin, not Indiana. However, Starlight Distributors (owned by old friends) is located just up the Knobs from here. Indiana cideries and meaderies, like New Day, use local apples and honey whenever practicable. Regional winemakers buy grapes and juice from other places, but increasingly source their grapes from local and regional vineyards. Admittedly, barley isn’t grown hereabouts, although it could be. Someday, it might, especially after we conquer the next five percent.

And I want you to know that when you’re in Aurora, Bedford, Bloomington, Columbus or Nashville, there are breweries waiting to serve you (if you’re 21, of course) … that cider can be dry, and craft meads can be as variously costumed as craft beers … and that today’s Indiana wineries don’t restrict themselves to the sadly apocryphal sweet Manischewitz clones.

On Saturday, in addition to what I’m describing here, there’ll be booths, food, children’s activities and music out on Bank Street, courtesy of New Albany First and its Indie Fest.

There’ll also be all of downtown New Albany for roaming, and I wish you would roam it, because even though downtown always will be a work on progress and much remains to be done, more work’s already been done during the past five years than the quarter-century before – and this work has been undertaken almost exclusively by independent, small, local businesses.

These businesses are the real showcase on September 22. I’m choosing beer, cider, mead and wine to make my point about me, my business, and all the other indies. You can choose another platform, but the most important thing is the simplest: Make a choice.

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Now, back to Louisville Craft Beer Week. The third edition begins this Friday, September 21, and runs through the 29th. At last count, more than 61 events had been registered, and there’ll be a special pull-out section detailing them to be found in Wednesday’s edition of LEO Weekly.

Online, my friends at LouisvilleBeer.com is your conduit for LCBW events. Here’s the description of LCBW, 2012.

Louisville Craft Beer Week is a distinctively local celebration that seeks to educate and to raise awareness of the American Craft Beer Revolution at the local level, to showcase the incredible variety, dynamism, and expanding market presence of Craft Beer in Louisville, and to promote independent local establishments.

Louisville Craft Beer Week is a collaborative local mission. American Craft Brewing has re-established old traditions and created entirely new ones, and is closely tied to emerging ‘buy local’ principles. Local Craft Brewers are partners in the economic sense, perpetuating success by making the pie larger, and keeping money in our community.

Louisville Craft Beer Week is economic development. Craft Beer’s demographic is increasingly dynamic, but traditional patterns remain unchanged: youthful, college educated, well-traveled and affluent. The Internet is filled with urban revitalization success stories with a brewery as part of the scene, beginning with Governor John Hickenlooper’s Wynkoop Brewery in Lo-Do (Denver) in the 1980’s.

Louisville Craft Beer Week is all of us – brewers, wholesalers, package retailers, pubs, bars, and restaurants – but most importantly, Louisville Craft Beer Week is you – craft beer lovers living, working and playing right here in our city. Your patronage and enthusiasm makes it happen for all of us, and we thank you.

When you’re out and about during Louisville Craft Beer Week, always drink responsibly and whatever you do, don’t drive drunk.

ATC gives BSB a thumbs up, and work continues.

On Tuesday, Bank Street Brewhouse was given the Indiana Alcohol & Tobacco Commission's approval for floor plan changes, and now the WCTU Reading Room and Lloyd's Landing are legal habitats, respectively, for pouring and drinking Progressive Pints. Quite a bit remains to be done, but this first cleared hurdle is a relief.

As explained previously, the translucent panels above the WCTU Reading Room simply had to be replaced -- and work began Wednesday on a new, insulated, fully water-tight roof. From inception, the former patio's roof leaked, and while this mattered little when it still served as open-air romper room, converting it into a multi-purpose, all-weather area could not be achieved without a better roof.

Many thanks to Steve Resch and his merry band of workmen. There are none better in this city, and we appreciate them.

2 - Interior work taking place at Bank Street Brewhouse.

The pipes form a separation between the bar area, which is restricted to those over 21 years of age, and the all-ages area in the remainder of the WCTU Reading Room. Lloyd's Landing also will function as an all-ages area.

In the second photo, the pipes will angle toward the door, enabling its continued use for customers of all ages. Once approved, the back bar build-out can continue, with taps re-installed and other necessary shelves and items added. When the weather is appropriate and the garage doors open into Lloyd's Landing, you'll be able to walk in and out, and go to the bar to get beers.

Other work to be finished soon includes a new roof for this space, and a floor sealing. There'll be new tables and chairs, with the picnic tables weatherized and moved outside to Lloyd's Landing.

Given the quality of Chef Matt's menu and the smallness of the Bank Street Brewhouse kitchen, it will continue to be the case that food can be served only to those seated in the current dining room and the Taxpayers Memorial Patio on the Bank Street side. There'll be a hostessing system of some sort to guide diners to their tables. By the summer of 2013, once air conditioning is installed, we'll be able to use the WCTU Reading Room for tastings and events, as well as for beer dinners and functions specifically catered in advance.

Smoking will be allowed ONLY in the Lloyd's Landing garden area. Accordingly, we'll create a roofed area with benches.

The most important aspect of these improvements is the very first one: Approval by the state's regulatory authorities. Once that's done, the rest of it will fall into place.

1 - Exterior work taking place at Bank Street Brewhouse.

The street-side stone block wall on the south side of the Taxpayers Memorial Patio has been extended to enclose it on three sides, which (finally) will convince walkers to remain on the sidewalk, and not cut through. Because the closest garage door, when opened, must include a "separation" between the all-ages patio and the +21 years of age bar space, there soon will be a wooden counter top installed in place of the rope.

Since I took these photos, the wooden fencing and gates have been completed. Once approved, we'll be able to open the garage doors on the north side of the WCTU Reading Room and be as one with Lloyd's Landing. It is unclear whether public access will be allowed through the front gate, but this will be resolved quite soon.

You'll notice that the hedgerow and tree are gone. I hate cutting down trees, but this one was terminally ill. The entire northern expanse of Lloyd's Landing along the concrete retaining wall now holds the possibility of growing ornamental (perhaps even usable) hops on trellises, which can be anchored to the wooden fencing.

This and other landscaping embellishments will take some time to achieve, as will removing portions of the pavement and replacing them with permeable surface. The plan is to use Lloyd's Landing as much as possible in the interim, and design the specifics as we go forward.

Bank Street Brewhouse's former patio will be rechristened as the WCTU Reading Room.

See also: Construction on Lloyd's Landing at Bank Street Brewhouse begins. Here are the plans and details.

With the imminent expansion of Bank Street Brewhouse to the north, creating an outdoor garden to be known as Lloyd’s Landing in honor of the late Lloyd “Highwayman” Wimp, we will rechristen the former covered patio space as the WCTU Reading Room.

This requires a brief explanation.

Once upon a time, there were three separate lots between the Fox law office building to the south of Bank Street Brewhouse, and the Ricke agency to the north. Three grand houses built during the city of New Albany’s 19th-century adolescence stood on these lots until just after World War II. The first house to be demolished was the middle one, around 1950. Bank Street Brewhouse now operates from the remodeled garage building erected there.

Circa 1955, the houses on either side also were taken down, to be replaced by parking lots. It so happens that the house on the north side of Bank Street Brewhouse was owned for a very long time by New Albany’s branch of the Women’s Christian Temperance Union. City guides dating from 1954 all the way back to 1919 identify the house as the WCTU’s chapter headquarters.

The NA-FC library’s web site contains a snippet about this long forgotten structure, as written in 1937 – just after Prohibition mercifully ended.

In the year 1852 Mr. John Crawford built and sold to Mr. Silas Day the large brick house on the west side of Bank Street now owned by the W.C.T.U. This was an example of a New Albany home of the better class in the 1850s and 1860s, and Mrs. Bowman, a daughter of Mr. Day, gives us a glimpse of the family life. She says, "I have a vivid memory of a morning when the family gathered in the back parlor for prayers, a daily institution in our home. I can see the large room, the light filtering through the shutters upon the white and gold walls, the green velvet carpet, the black haircloth furniture, and the tamboured muslin curtains, and I can see the form of my sister, a bride, lately returned from her wedding journey, sitting at the melodeon, leading us in our usual morning hymns. I remember her morning robe of buff pique, form-fitting, and opening all down the front over an under robe of white embroidery. She looked beautiful to my admiring eyes. The melodeon was always used at prayers and to accompany hymn singing on Sunday evenings.

I’m uncertain precisely when the WCTU came to inhabit the house, although in 1882, New Albany’s chapter merited mention in the “Minutes of the Woman's Christian Temperance Union of the State of Indiana at the Annual Meeting.

It is reasonable to surmise that the New Albany WCTU’s zenith came in the early years of the 20th-century, during the successful campaign for nationwide Prohibition. Accordingly, Prohibition’s myriad and well-documented subsequent failures corroded the strength of America’s teetotalers. These days in New Albany, the craft brewing revolution flourishes on the very spot where its enemies once thrived, and symbolism like this is too delicious to ignore.

Hence, the evolution of the WCTU Reading Room at Bank Street Brewhouse. Your suggestions and questions are welcomed.

Construction on Lloyd's Landing at Bank Street Brewhouse begins this week. Here are the plans and details.

From the inception of NABC’s Bank Street Brewhouse in 2009, it has been our ultimate aim to annex the remainder of the parking area on the building’s north side, and to build an outdoor garden for use in seasonable weather -- although I realize “seasonable” is somewhat the subjective term these days.

I’m happy to announce that finally, the time has come to begin this project. On Thursday (August 23), work will commence with the construction of walls and fences to delineate the rectangular outdoor space, thus complying with state alcoholic beverage regulations governing its future use by craft beer drinkers.

This all-ages outdoor space will be called Lloyd’s Landing, in honor of our cherished friend, the late Lloyd “Highwayman” Wimp.

It is my belief that we can have Alcohol and Tobacco Commission approval for this new “patio” (legally, it will be referred to as a “patio,” not a “beer garden” as such, although this is a mere technicality) in our hands by the first week of September.

This means a few changes, clarifications and explanations.

(1) From the time that construction starts this Thursday, vehicular access to the parking area will cease. According to ATC regulations, there can be no back-and-forth in the ground’s daily usage. Once the parking area has been licensed by the ATC for people and their beers, it no longer can be used to park their cars.

(2) Parking alternatives are many. There is unmetered parking on Bank Street itself. The parking lot across Bank Street once again is open, and the lot adjacent to the Carnegie Center, while signposted for Carnegie use, can be used in daytime. The Fox Law parking lot on the south side of Bank Street Brewhouse can be used after 5:00 p.m., and so can the Schad Law parking spaces, just east of the Carnegie Center and visible from Bank Street Brewhouse. For those interested in centrally located parking to facilitate roaming throughout historic downtown New Albany, please be aware that the city’s parking garage on the corner of State and Market Streets is free on weeknights (after 5:00 p.m.) and on weekends. This is three blocks from Bank Street Brewhouse to the southwest.

(3) The former roofed patio, which was modified earlier this year by the installation of garage doors facing north, now will be considered part of the original building’s extended floor plan, thus enabling us to build out and use the rear bar area. This former patio space will be referred to as the WCTU Reading Room, for reasons to be explained elsewhere.

(3) The officially designated smoking area will be the entirety of the Lloyd’s Landing outdoor garden expanse, as accessed through the door to the left and rear of the WCTU Reading Room. Because the WCTU Reading Room is a building and not a patio, state law forbids smoking inside it.

(4) Our newly evolving public areas have specific purposes. Lloyd’s Landing is intended as an outdoor area for the enjoyment of beers, entertainment and special events (weather permitting). When fully weatherized, the WCTU Reading Room is intended as a year-round casual use area for beers. Weather permitting, it will be a garage-doors-up, natural extension of Lloyd’s Landing. It also will be capable of adaptation for special events, tastings and gatherings (like the Prost room at NABC’s original location). Because Bank Street Brewhouse’s kitchen is small, food service will remain a feature of the BSB main dining room, bar and current street-side Taxpayers Memorial Patio. Eventually, you’ll be able to enjoy a pleasant drink outside, and then be seated when a dining area table is ready.

(5) These first steps (fencing and licensing) are only the beginning. They will be followed by much more work: Lloyd’s Landing surfacing, furnishings and landscaping; WCTU Reading Room roof, furnishings and bar completion; and the step-by-step process of coordinating them all. We will complete these steps as time and money permit.

Thanks for your patience as we begin the build-out. Your suggestions and questions are welcomed.