It's Louisville Craft Beer Week 2016.

For events, go here:

2016 Louisville KY Craft Beer Week Events #LCBW2016

For the conceptual overview, go here:

WTF is LCBW?

The primary goal of Louisville KY Craft Beer Week (LCBW) is to promote our area’s thriving craft beer culture, enhancing beer knowledge and appreciation by sponsoring a 9-day (two weekend) festival that attracts beer tourism, fosters knowledge of our regional brewing heritage, and serves as a showcase for the Louisville KY area’s breweries, restaurants, pubs, retailers, and other businesses with ties to the craft beer community.

LCBW runs from September 16-24, 2016 and features a wide variety of events highlighting Kentuckiana’s vibrant craft beer culture. Craft beer lovers will have the opportunity to attend events ranging from beer dinners and food pairing to beer walks, bar promotions, brewery parties and plenty more.

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The deliciousness of Indian food at the molecular level.

It seems impossible, but I tasted Indian food for the first time only in 1989. It was somewhere in Europe; probably Copenhagen, though the memory is fleeting. During the "Public House Era" in the 1990s, a few of the bar flies occasionally organized excursions to Louisville KY's Hurstbourne area (Shalimar?) I can still taste the lime pickle from Cambridge UK, circa 1998. In the late 2000s, an Indian restaurant lasted for a few months in Clarksville.

My point in this historical digression: Can someone from the Subcontinent come to New Albany? Indian food is the missing link in our restaurant scene.

Soon, please. Thank you.

Scientists have figured out what makes Indian food so delicious, by Roberto A. Ferdman (Washington Post)

Researchers have data crunched 2,500 recipes and found the secret to their success.

Indian food, with its hodgepodge of ingredients and intoxicating aromas, is coveted around the world. The labor-intensive cuisine and its mix of spices is more often than not a revelation for those who sit down to eat it for the first time. Heavy doses of cardamom, cayenne, tamarind and other flavors can overwhelm an unfamiliar palate. Together, they help form the pillars of what tastes so good to so many people.

But behind the appeal of Indian food — what makes it so novel and so delicious — is also a stranger and subtler truth. In a large new analysis of more than 2,000 popular recipes, data scientists have discovered perhaps the key reason why Indian food tastes so unique: It does something radical with flavors, something very different from what we tend to do in the United States and the rest of Western culture. And it does it at the molecular level.

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It reminds me of 10 Barrel: "The AB-InBev “Why Don’t They Like Us” Tour Continues."

I'm coming late to this one, but better late than never.

The AB-InBev “Why Don’t They Like Us” Tour Continues, by Dan (The Full Pint)

 ... In these articles, we’ve learned that the corporate giant is organizing a dog and pony show (why the long face), in which they are prancing out these figureheads to beer bars in what I’d like to call the “Why don’t they like us?” tour. I say the corporate giant is behind this, as I would hope these newly minted millionaires would be satisfied with the business decision they recently made, and didn’t decide to go on this PR tour on their own. I don’t recall Ben & Jerry scrambling for street cred after selling to Unilever. Dr. Dre didn’t go back to Compton and pander to the homies after selling Beats to Apple for a few billion. Frankly, this is downright embarrassing to watch.

That's spot on.

Once you've sold out, at least have the decency to wear a suit and "own" your defection. See the zombie ... be the zombie.

I wrote the following words in November, 2014, and they're worth standing by. Just substitute the latest brewery name to go, and adjust the cited figure from 3,000 to 4,000-plus.

See? It's easy.

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Who gives a flying fuck?

10 Barrel's dead as Monty Python's parrot. Find a cheap preacher, pay your respects and bring flowers. Then move on.

10 Barrel's just Zombie "Craft" now.

It's Trojan Ten Barrel.

Don't confuse me with someone who gives a fuck.

You see, back before the beer narcissists were born, we had a revolution to take beer back from the grimy corporatist likes of AB-InBev, which has been, and always will be, the foremost enemy of better beer in this world, as we know it.

Obviously, AB-InBev has the ample resources to buy its way to alleged respectability. Just as obviously, this is the fundamental problem, because money cannot buy authenticity. Even more obviously, drinkers of better beer have hundreds -- nay, thousands -- of legitimate small breweries to choose from, ones that have not been irrevocably bastardized by association (and ownership) with a company that's the closest thing to a Great Beer Satan as we're likely to see in this world ... as we know it.

If you doubt it, do some cursory research on AB-InBev's repellant company history as a symbol of everything wrong with beer and capitalism. It ain't pretty, and I'm sorry if it steps all over your sense of entitlement. Appeasing it does not change the paradigm.

You see, selling one's soul isn't about gray areas. When you sell your soul, you sell your soul. That's what this is about, and whenever possible, in a probably doomed effort to hold onto what tiny bits of soul I may as yet possess, I try not to hand my money over to those who've sold theirs. It's as simple as that. Better beer owes its existence to pride, ideas and principles .. to its very soul.

Sacrifice the soul and you're handing over the revolution to the very same soulless vampires it was fought against in the first place.

It's as simple as that.

10 Barrel's unfortunate demise signals yet again AB-InBev's dull intent to buy what it cannot create. Fortunately, 3,000 other breweries remain that are small, local and real. Pick a few, enjoy their beers, and give your soul some nourishment. Be local. Case closed.

Rest in peace, 10 Barrel Brewing. I'm sure your beers were great, but you're dead now. Who gives a fuck?

Let's have a better beer, shall we?

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Reach out and touch Against the Grain on the occasion of its 5th anniversary party.

Strangely, the e-mail did not generate virtual chicken feathers. Here's the story.

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Against the Grain
401 E. Main Street
Louisville KY, KY 40202
502-515-0174
atgbrewery.com

It’s a quinquennial celebration!

Our five-year anniversary is not to be taken lightly as we’ve been planning it all these years! We’ll be opening our time capsule filled with treasure from our first year, along with, music from Tony and the Tan Lines, a giant chiquen piñata, and more oohs and ahhs to party all night long. Everyone who is anyone is going to be there, so you might as well come too.

For more information on our anniversary party or any other happenings at Against the Grain, please reach out!

Katie Molck
Marketing & Media Maven

AFTER THE FIRE: England, or one man's heightened cholesterol panic is another man's nostalgic repast (2013).

AFTER THE FIRE: England, or one man's heightened cholesterol panic is another man's nostalgic repast (2013).

A weekly column by Roger A. Baylor.

As originally published at Louisville KYBeer.com in December, 2013, and while previously reprinted here at the blog, I've been daydreaming about Real Ale again. Will Brexit have an affect on traditional ale in the UK (or what comes of it)? I've no idea, but let's hope not.

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“The secret of a happy life is to know when to stop – and then go that bit further.”
–Inspector Morse, classic British television police crime solver

The very least I could do during two weeks spent in England’s lovely West Country was to ingest my gout medicine each and every morning without fail – preferably washed down with a pint of cask-conditioned Bitter from one of those pubs nearby already dispensing it, but in a pinch, grudgingly conceding the utility of mere water.

Yes, I know: Fish do IT in THAT. The solution? Eat more fish, especially with chips.

Somewhere a health fanatic reads and brays with dismay, but have no fear. It’s only despairing, defeatist clatter of the sort Winston Churchill wouldn’t have countenanced, even after his morning bottle of champagne, and these naysayers are inaudible to me — fully muffled by the cacophonous sizzle of a traditional English breakfast frying atop the stove, even the waxy tomato from Tesco’s, because it is destined for maximum exposure to hot oil just like all the rest.

Queue the Elgar, and consider this partial list of foodstuffs joyfully consumed during my holiday, including both local “English” fare and widely available culinary options borrowed from elsewhere.

Anchovies fillets (fresh)
Bacon
Baked beans
Bangers and mash
Black pudding (i.e., blood sausage)
Cornish pasties
Crab sandwiches
Egg rolls
Falafel
Fish pie (not Stargazy pie, alas)
Gajrati (regional vegetarian Indian)
Haddock and chips
Pie, mash, eel and liquor (the latter is gravy)
Pizza (loaded)
Smoked salmon
Spanish tapas
Steak & kidney pie
Thai red curry
Yorkshire pudding

Alas, I digress. It generally is my custom to entertain and inform in purely fermentable measures of prose, and yet on this most recent English holiday in July, 2013, I found it quite unthinkable to separate the culinary from the ale-mentary.

Overall, ways of the new were not my objective, and I did not search for top chefs flashing their own branded apron and sauce wear. Rather, my task was to focus on the glories of the much maligned traditional English table, and to accompany them with the native products of classic ale-making.

Mission accomplished. First, let’s review the liquidity to be found in a reference volume.

Just after purchasing plane tickets, and before any other arrangements had been made, I purchased the essential book for ale hunting in the United Kingdom: “Campaign for Real Ale (CAMRA) Good Beer Guide,” edited by Roger Protz, and fully revised for publication each year.

CAMRA is the beer world’s oldest and most doggedly pervasive consumer protection society, founded in 1973 for the express purposes of espousing and protecting cask-conditioned “real” ale from the intrusions of modern times. What exactly is cask-conditioned “real” ale? CAMRA explains:

Real ale is a natural product brewed using traditional ingredients and left to mature in the cask (container) from which it is served in the pub through a process called secondary fermentation. It is this process which makes real ale unique amongst beers and develops the wonderful tastes and aromas which processed beers can never provide.

Just know that traditional cask-conditioned ale is a living entity. It is pre-industrial, “slow” beer at its finest, predating every advance in ease of packaging, and preceding all processing shortcuts undertaken for the sake of modernity.

Consequently, as a product requiring training, thought and effort to maintain and dispense properly, real ale and the pub where it is consumed are inextricably linked. In America, the “coldest beer in town” merely signposts the triumph of refrigeration. In England, the best pint of real ale within walking distance of a bus stop is stirring testament to the publican’s commitment to craft.

That’s why CAMRA’S beer guide is vital. The organization’s local chapter members serve as diligent boots on the ground, studiously analyzing ales and pubs on a daily basis. Their intelligence gathering is the heart of the book, making it the top source of information for the visitor who cares less about his bed and breakfast than finding pints of fresh ale. Which pubs are tops at tending their firkins? What do they usually pour? Do they serve snacks or meals? Are they hosts for discourse in their community? The book provides these answers, and many more.

My first visit to Devon and Cornwall was in 2009, and four years later, there have been changes in the pub scene. Owing to regulatory, political and societal factors too numerous to recount, pubs in the UK are diminishing in number, and that’s a bad sign. At the same time, there are more breweries now at work than at any point in a half-century.

Dozens of newcomers are brewing classic ale styles — Mild, Bitter, IPA, Stout and Porter – alongside newer variations, and they’re supplying local pubs. There may be fewer venues, but the range of choice probably is greater. Session strengths (below 4.5% abv) remain the norm, and while I might drop names (St. Austell, Skinner’s, Summerskill and Bridgetown), it wouldn’t matter, because none of the beers brewed by these excellent breweries are available anywhere close to Louisville KY. This is as it should be. They await your arrival, over there.

On a sunny Sunday in July, my wife’s cousin drove us from the city of Plymouth to the Dartmoor National Park. There, surrounded by rolling, sparse uplands and freely roaming sheep, we dined at a venerable establishment called the Dartmoor Inn in Merrivale. I enjoyed roast beef with gravy, cabbage, vegetables and Yorkshire pudding. Two pints of well-tuned local Jail Ale from the Dartmoor Brewery in nearby Princetown completed this time-honored Sunday Roast.

Frankly, I gloried in the ambience: Dark walls, wooden beams, a low-hanging ceiling and a fireplace, with humps, stoops and irregular measurements, and overall, minimal space for a heavyweight like me to navigate. The roasted meal was deliciously overcooked, and the ale’s ideally balanced malt and hops kept my palate sharp amid the meat and butter. It was the embodiment of a lifetime’s fascination with BBC News, “The Last of the Summer Wine” and maritime gin rations.

But what of the calories and cholesterol?

Whenever healthfulness began encroaching, I merely reached for another custard tart, found the closest CAMRA-listed pub, and waited for the feeling to pass.

Brew, Britannia.

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September 5: AFTER THE FIRE: Beer stories and bedtime for gonzo (2013).

August 29: AFTER THE FIRE: In the Red Room, we’re all left – right?

August 22: AFTER THE FIRE: Drink, smoke and enjoy.

August 15: AFTER THE FIRE: Listening to "Dixieland" jazz, and thinking about drinking a beer.

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Read about the advent of Corn King IPA.

Click through for complete details.

Time’s running out to get one of the nation’s most unique beers, by Tristan Schmid (Brewers of Indiana Guild)

Today 3 Floyds bottled a one-of-a-kind IPA that represents one of the most unique ways in the nation to support and enjoy craft beer, and time is running out for you to get it.

This morning, Corn King IPA hit 22 oz. bombers and kegs, destined for the tastebuds of IN Beer Brigade members at release parties around the state in October, the first of which will be held at 18th Street Brewing’s stunning Hammond location on Oct. 3, followed by others to be announced this week.

The only way to get Corn King IPA is by enlisting in the IN Beer Brigade. You can’t buy it at 3 Floyds or anywhere else.
Last month, 3 Floyds and Hoosier breweries from across Northwestern Indiana collaborated on the Corn King IPA brew day, mashing in locally grown corn malted by Sugar Creek Malt Co. of Lebanon, IN to create a highly sippable hoppy beer with crisp citrus notes and a smooth finish.

The 74 IBU, 7.3% ABV beer will pair excellently with a Sunday brunch or a local burger.

Enlist in the base membership level for access to buy pints of the beer at the release parties.

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The great wine fraud? Nothing to see here, beer hoarders -- right?

The stakes may be smaller as they pertain to your White Whale stash of "mine all mine" beers, but it might be time to beware the forgers.

Counterfeit Pliny? Well, all it takes is a Koch brother and a few wheelbarrows of cash.

The great wine fraud, by Ed Cumming (The Guardian)

Rudy Kurniwan amassed a vast fortune trading in rare wines. Trouble is, he was bottling them himself. Ed Cumming reports on a vintage swindle

The world’s biggest wine forger started small. It was the early 2000s, and a young man who went by the name of Rudy Kurniawan began to make a name for himself on the Los Angeles scene. He had swept-back hair and a hearty laugh. More importantly, he had pockets of seemingly infinite depth, so his new friends overlooked his mysterious origins. It was said he came from a wealthy Sino-Indonesian family, living large off handouts. But nobody pressed too hard as long as the dinners – and booze – kept flowing.

Kurniawan also had a palate of rare finesse, better than most at identifying the characteristics of different vintages. Or at least, that’s what the people he fooled said ...

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NABC all-female ownership: An admirable goal, but 100% minus 33% does not equal 100%.

It's important for NABC to keep on keeping on, and I appreciate David Kahl's article.

However, there's a small factual problem with one section of it, and it has the effect of ruining the otherwise positive vibe, at least for me.

5 Things You Didn’t Know About New Albanian Brewing Company, by David Kahl (Indiana on Tap)

NABC is 100% owned by women

NABC underwent a change of ownership lately (well, really, a change of shareholdings) when Roger Baylor left the business to run for mayor of New Albany. As he departs, the sister team of Amy Baylor and Kate Lewison assume 100% control of the company. Beer, of course, is gender neutral.

In fact, there has been no change of shareholdings.

As of today, I own 33% of the two NABC incorporations, just as I have from their inception. I've been removed as corporate officer of these entities, but have not yet been remunerated, and until this occurs, it's inaccurate to suggest that the companies are 100% female-owned -- even if I support this ultimate goal, and I do support it.

It's a buy-out ... not a donate-out, and I've contacted Indiana on Tap requesting a correction. To Mr. Kahl, my apologies. I'm sorry you were misled.

By the way, John Mahorney designered the NABC logo. Tony Beard's done it all since then, but John's designer has stood the test of time.

For more, go here: The Independent.

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One vast hospital: Flying Dog's Saw Bones Ginger Table Beer.

It was our first evening in Frederick, Maryland, and we happened upon an old, dignified building with Ralph Steadman's crazed images filling a window display.

Eastern USA Road Trip 2016, Day 9: Antietam and a detour through Civil War medicine.

The building is the National Museum of Civil War Medicine.

Follow in the footsteps of soldiers and surgeons to discover the harsh conditions, personal sacrifices, and brilliant innovations of Civil War medicine, innovations that continue to save lives today.

The window display was about a special collaboration beer from Flying Dog, born in Colorado, now a Frederick staple. I'm old enough to remember the Denver facility, as visited during the GABF.

In 1990, George (Stranahan) founded the Flying Dog Brewpub in Aspen, Colorado. From that brewpub to a full-fledged Denver brewery (co-founded by George and his longtime friend and partner, Richard McIntyre) in 1994, and then to our current state-of-the-art brewing facility in Frederick, Maryland, Flying Dog continues to make sense.

The special beer is offbeat even by Flying Dog standards.

Flying Dog is Ready to Release its Civil War-Inspired Beer: Saw Bones, by James Michael Causey (Washingtonian)

Bottles and battles come together with the May 27 release of Saw Bones, a first-time collaboration between two Frederick-based entities: Flying Dog Brewery and the National Museum of Civil War Medicine.

It’s a unique pairing, admits David Price, executive director of the museum, whose mission is to research and preserve the legacy of Civil War-era medicine. Price, a consultant on the PBS series Mercy Street about a Civil War hospital in Alexandria, says the beer is part of a wider outreach campaign to make history more exciting–not to mention palatable.

As befits a beer with Ralph Steadman's art on the label, Flying Dog gets sassy with the whole concept.

During the height of the Civil War, our hometown of Frederick was given the nickname “One Vast Hospital.” With Maryland smack dab in the middle of the Union and Confederacy, patients often outnumbered residents. To this day, if you stand on a quiet street after sunset, you can still hear them singing “Hard Tack Come Again No More.”

Despite pioneering a good bit of modern medicine, doctors were dubbed “saw bones.” While the literal sometimes occurred for those on the wrong end of a musket, Saw Bones were also revered for hand-made elixirs in which the cure-all nature of both ginger and lemon were common.

To pay homage to the hard-working people on Mercy Street, we enlisted the National Museum of Civil War Medicine to bring you a new Saw Bones in the form of a Belgian-style table beer with ginger and lemon. Crisp and clean on the palette with bold citrus, spice and malt character, it’s just what the doctor ordered.

So, in the end, we visited the museum and I bought a six-pack. Saw Bones reminds me of NABC's Tafel, and I like it, even with less ginger character than I'd have thought. It's a one-off, and isn't expected to return.

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Brewer's Alley and Monocacy Brewing in Frederick MD.

Brewer's Alley.

As is our custom, we chose a place to stay for two nights in Frederick, Maryland predominantly on the basis of location. We try to be as near the center of downtown as possible, because walking is good -- especially when you drink.

Eastern USA Road Trip 2016, Day 8: Civil War history in Frederick, Maryland and environs.

Happily, the Brewer's Alley brewpub (established 1996) lay within walking distance of our B & B, as did a couple dozen other eateries and bars. The back story of Brewer's Alley is worth repeating.

The original 217 gallon brewhouse at Brewer’s Alley Restaurant and Brewery introduced craft beer enthusiasts to many varieties of local, independent beer. Since 1996, guests visiting the brewpub in Downtown Frederick took in the sights and smells of our copper-clad brewhouse producing award-winning beer. Due to the ever increasing demand for Brewer’s Alley brands, the original brewhouse was removed from its location at the brewpub in January, 2012.

Today, we produce and package Brewer’s Alley beer at an off-site manufacturing brewery called Monocacy Brewing Company, in Frederick, MD. At this location, the brewing staff from Brewer’s Alley brew each batch of our year-round and seasonal beers. In late 2012, our new, custom-built 93 gallon brewhouse was delivered for testing at Monocacy Brewing Company. This system will be installed at Brewer’s Alley Restaurant and Brewery in the near future and will serve as the launchpad for small batch seasonal varieties and new creations.

During our second visit, the server explained more clearly the "shared ownership" connection between Brewer's Alley and Monocacy Brewing, and I was able to sample a few beers from each.

Welcome to Monocacy Brewing Company where our focus is on crafting quality beer. We are proudly brewing our award winning beers in the old Ebert’s Ice Cream plant located in historic Downtown Frederick. At MBC we strive to be a great neighbor and representative of Frederick’s local allure.

Opened in November of 2011, Monocacy Brewing Company crafts unique, full-flavored ales and lagers. Our staff of talented and experienced brewers are committed to promoting the use of fresh, local ingredients and releasing a portfolio of beer styles that appeals to all beer drinkers’ tastes The brewery also functions as a contract bottling facility for Frederick County’s original brewpub, Brewer’s Alley. 

Broadly generalizing, the Brewer's Alley staples are classic food-friendly styles like Nut Brown and Kölsch. 1634 Ale was especially enjoyable; it's one of those fascinating historical throwback recipes with barley, wheat, rye, caraway and molasses.

All of them are accomplished, but special praise to the Hefeweizen. While my judgment is unscientific, I haven't tasted a better Hefeweizen from an American "craft" brewery. It is balanced between fruit and clove, and delicious on a hot, humid day.

Conversely, Monocacy Brewing seems designered to travel the more esoteric end of the spectrum; I liked Riot Rye and Gose of Althea. Before you life an eyebrow, remember that I had two nightly sessions to enjoy all these beers.

After the second of our two visits to Brewer's Alley, I was looking for a nightcap to take home. There's a bottle shop down the street, and there I spotted a tasty regional selection in a 750 ml bottle: Victory Sour Monkey, a "Sour Brett Tripel."

A perfect ending.


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AFTER THE FIRE: Beer stories and bedtime for gonzo (2013).

AFTER THE FIRE: Beer stories and bedtime for gonzo (2013).

A weekly column by Roger A. Baylor.

As originally published at LouisvilleBeer.com on December 30, 2013, and previously not offered in its entirety here at the blog. It's been three years, though it seems like only yesterday.

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“All great literature is one of two stories; a man goes on a journey or a stranger comes to town.”
–Leo Tolstoy

It’s been a long, strange trip, hasn’t it?

The first brewing insurgency of the modern American era began at New Albion Brewing Company, which commenced operations in Sonoma, California, in 1976. Auspiciously, a revolution in beer was spawned in the very same year as America’s Bicentennial celebrated the culmination of a previous uprising.

As a casual student of history, I’m aware that almost inevitably, revolutions consolidate into their own systematized pecking orders, even as they mature and gravitate toward future appointments with reinvention (arguably the best case scenario) or, more often, messy counter-revolutions.

Maybe we’re witnessing one or both of these outcomes just now in the world of beer.

These days, what used to be known as microbrewing bears the designeration of craft beer, and in terms of consumer recognition, the siren’s call of mainstream acceptance beckons. If this weren’t the case, there’d be no Blue Moon or Shock Top, those sleek mockrobrews designered and distributed by mass-market brewers for the express purpose of pilfering craft brewing’s vibrant foundational imagery for the benefit of shelf space and engorged multinational shareholders.

Yet in fairness, there’d also not be a Sierra Nevada factory perched incongruously amid the Appalachians, or Lagunitas situated on both the Pacific and Gold Coasts. When it comes to robber baron capitalism, pecking orders frequently can be brutal, and maybe we’re not doing so well with our own institutional imagery if the misty mythology no longer seems worth protecting.

Not everyone sees it this way, and the fact that I persist in doing so clearly marks me as an aging craft beer militant, one whose radical worldview was shaped by an active desire for better beer, close to home, amid a denuded landscape of ridiculously limited choice. There were fewer than 100 breweries in the United States when I attained legal drinking age in 1981; more than 30 years later, the number is 2,500. The beer scene has mutated beyond recognition and comprehension, and the revolutionary cadres have splintered into multiple spheres of specialized interests.

A homebrewing culture analyzes beer by ingredients and methodology, espousing a “brew it yourself” ethos, while traders and swappers revel in the mechanics of the chase, the art of the deal, and the joy of collecting.

There is a priestly ratings caste trumpeting the presumed exactitude and objectivity of language in quantifying beer, and a localist persuasion embracing the personal, grassroots experience of craft beer in the context of places and people.

On widely scattered occasions, albeit rare, these spheres even manage to overlap. Me? I’m an ardent localist, with an asterisk.

For those of us who grew to beer-turity prior to the Internet’s incursions, when social media was a figment of Dick Tracy’s wrist radio – the downtrodden tightly clutching dog-eared books written by the late beer writer Michael Jackson and anointing him as a reliable guide for pursuit of the perfect pint — one of the most important aspects of craft beer is the ability to tell a good story.

Jackson excelled at it. He was a journalist by trade, and relentlessly factual in his approach, yet a sheer delight in storytelling is his primary legacy, especially through a knack for linking good beer with interesting people in specific places. At the end of the day, what else is there?

I found myself reacting to these stories first by repeating them, and later, augmenting them with embellishment from personal experiences, the latter gained initially by traveling, and later by operating my own pub. They became personal gateway beer tales, tied inextricably together, addressing the past and advocating the future.

In 1992, the pub itself represented the logical conclusion to my quest. What we needed in my hometown was a beer culture of its own, one embodying the litany of who, what, where and why. Elements of other beer cultures could be adapted and deployed toward this end, but the objective never was to “be” Bamberg (to cite one example).

Rather, it was to create a milieu that would provide a local experience similar to Bamberg, primarily for those of us living here, and also for those who’d like to come visit. Eventually, we’d have our own brewery, which would be the apogee; locally brewed beer as restorative and springboard.

Central to all of this was, and is, storytelling. Nowadays, quality craft beer storytelling is hardly dead, although I fear it’s gone into some manner of cryogenic hibernation. In the present time, craft beer enthusiasm is expressed with a throwaway brevity, defying any true depth of feeling; miles-wide, inches-deep. Social media affords an abundance of minimal exposure, trivializing and often eliminating context. Beer lovers check in, tweet, post and rate – and yet they hardly ever tell stories.

I find it profoundly sad.

Consider the typically triumphant craft beer photo on Facebook, Twitter or Pinterest. Usually it’s a hard-to-find beer from a highly rated brewery, the further from home and harder to source, the better. The beer’s “proper” signature glass is strategically situated, half-filled and seductive.

Unfortunately, what’s missing are human beings and an explanation for why any of it matters, and the end result is craft beer objectified, little more than accumulated beer porn to the practicing fetishist, without any need for an accompanying story because fellow beer narcissists are expected to already feel the tumescence of the titillation, and automatically shift into fully salivating Pavlovian mutt at the first glimpse of the visual prompt.

We all do it, even me.

As Billie Holiday sang long ago, “Them that’s got shall have, them that’s not shall lose.” I don’t root for the haves. Underdogs are way more appealing.
I’m tired of losing, not in the superficial sense of final game scores or reds and blacks on a bank balance sheet, but from acquiescing for far too long in a process whereby the collective I’ve spent a quarter-century assembling somehow tosses away the thread of its own narrative.

Rather than gaze longingly upon someone else’s masturbatory beer glass, I’d rather be able to tell the story of why the liquid in the glass is important, assuming it still is – and to be perfectly honest, there are times when I have serious doubts as to whether any meaning remains to be examined, although as a contrarian of long and sincere standing, I’m honor-bound and forever obliged to doubt and re-examine even those precepts nearest and dearest to my heart.

However, what I know beyond a shadow of doubt is that in the year 201417, it is time to tell more stories, not fewer, and to remove craft beer from its selfie-induced vacuum by relating it to the real world outside. Stories build community by reinforcing beer’s local origins, and stories just might be the best way to reach the next 10%, absent the pomp, circumstance and end-zone chest-thumping that has come so infuriatingly to define and bastardize the genre.

In order to complete the journey, perhaps we must come back to town, back to the origins, and back to the notion of there being no such thing as strangers, only those who haven’t yet become friends. Maybe the best way to become friends is to have a chat, not compare soiled raincoats.

Just think about it. Quite possibly, there’s something left to learn.

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August 29: AFTER THE FIRE: In the Red Room, we’re all left – right?

August 22: AFTER THE FIRE: Drink, smoke and enjoy.

August 15: AFTER THE FIRE: Listening to "Dixieland" jazz, and thinking about drinking a beer.

August 8: AFTER THE FIRE: A pre-digital Bohemian vignette, 1989.

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A lovely Best Bitter at Northampton Brewery.

Labor Day was Monday, September 5. It also was our third and last day in South Hadley, and a final outing was planned in the city of Northampton.

Eastern USA Road Trip 2016, Day 7: Northampton MA and Labor Day in a Blue State.

It will surprise absolutely no one who knows me that Job One was lunch at a brewery.

The Northampton Brewery was conceived as a community center for great food and drink; where families get together for quality time; good friends hang out and catch up; groups meet for pleasure or business; and individuals come in to meet with regulars, or to play a little solitaire. The Brewery staff loves to meet new people and make everyone feel at home. It has become a favorite meeting place for locals and visiting guests.

In 1987 The Northampton Brewery was the second brewpub to open in the region preceded by the Commonwealth Brewing Company in Boston. Presently the Northampton Brewery is the oldest operating brewpub in New England.

The outdoor patio was packed, so we retreated indoors. My loaded burger and clam chowder were solid, but what impressed me most was a Daniel Shays Best Bitter. So few breweries in my neighborhood (anywhere?) bother any longer with stylistically accurate English-influenced styles. Northampton Brewery's version reminded me a bit of the ESB at Broad Ripple Brewing Company, though milder and at a lower alcohol content ... precisely as it should be.

You should be asking, "But Roger, who is Daniel Shays?" Given that I carry a Che wallet, I'm the perfect choice to Google.

Shays' Rebellion was an armed uprising in Massachusetts (mostly in and around Springfield) during 1786 and 1787. Revolutionary War veteran Daniel Shays led four thousand rebels (called Shaysites) in rising up against perceived economic injustices and suspension of civil rights (including multiple eviction and foreclosure notices) by Massachusetts, and in a later attempt to capture the United States' national weapons arsenal at the U.S. Armory at Springfield. Although Shays' Rebellion met with defeat militarily against a privately raised militia, it prompted numerous national leaders (including George Washington, who came out of retirement to deal with issues raised by Shays' Rebellion) to call for a stronger national government to suppress future rebellions, resulting in the U.S. Constitutional Convention and thereby "altering the course of U.S. history."

Food, drink and service were exemplary. When I expressed interest in buying a t-shirt, the manager set aside what she was doing to sift through the choices and find XXL sizes from which to choose.

All thumbs up. In all likelihood, the future holds more visits to the vicinity as the missus plays enthusiastic aunt to baby Ruby.

Northampton Brewery at Facebook.

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A glorious pushing of buttons: Rauchbier at Fort Hill Brewery in Easthampton MA.

Several years ago, when I was at peak NABC, we were approached by a local businessman who had purchased property in Starlight, very near Huber's Orchard, Vineyards and Winery and their rapidly growing Starlight Distillery.

To make a long story short, his idea was to build a German-influenced brewery up the road from Huber's, under the plausible theory that if hundreds of people are wiling to drive to Huber's for the day, they'd also stop at the brewery -- not only to buy take-away beer, but for the rural ambiance.

Nothing ever came of it, but now I've seen the real-world manifestation of what he envisioned. Clone this, drop it there. First, as noted at NAC ...

Eastern USA Road Trip 2016, Day 6: A trip to Gator's in Rhode Island.

After the excursion to Rhode Island to count coup with clams and beer, Ben drove directly to Fort Hill Brewery outside Easthampton. As the crow flies, the brewery is located only three or four miles from Ben's and Jen's house, but owing to the location of bridges on the Connecticut, it's a big 10-12 mile loop.

No matter, because I wasn't behind the wheel, and the point of the visit can be summarized by a single German compound word: Rauchbier.

Smoked beer.

When Ben first told me there was a brewery just a few miles away from his house that brewed Rauchbier all the year round, I started salivating. It was a gorgeous afternoon, and upon arrival, there was a musical duo playing inside, drinkers with picnic lunches spilling onto the front patio, and a mellow vibe overall.

I sampled a few of the house brews, drank a pint of Rauchbier and bought a case of mixed six packs to take back to Indiana. Every beer I tried was solid, even the spiced Doppelbock, and it strikes me that specializing in German styles is an idea too long ignored according to prevailing craft beer orthodoxy (even if Fort Hill offered Session IPA, too).

A final point of "wow" was on-premise six-pack pricing: $8 for six 12-oz cans. OF SMOKED LAGER ... or Märzen, or Hefeweizen ... and that's a steal given the quality.

At Fort Hill Brewery, we like to stand out. That's why we decided to use different colored tabs on our cans to identify our beers.

Red is for Red Flag
Black is for Rauch
Green is for King Mark
Blue is for Dopplebock

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About the Montague Bookmill, and a few beers in the Massachusetts countryside.

I'm gradually describing (and backdating) the Curmudgeons' eastern road trip, with cultural highlights usually recorded at NAC, and beers here at PC.

Eastern USA Road Trip 2016, Day 5: Ruby welcomes the Confidentials to Massachusetts.

On Saturday morning, we drove from Brattleboro, Vermont to South Hadley, Massachusetts, which didn't take very long, and my wife Diana enjoyed a long-awaited (well, five months) meeting with her niece's baby.

Later that same day, we all piled into one car to visit another niece. The choice of venue was near and dear of the heart of this drinking reader: A bookstore with food, beer and tunes.

It's hard not to like a bookstore with a tag like this: Books you don't need in a place you can't find. Accordingly, the Montague Bookmill is a used bookstore housed in an 1842 grist mill, located along the highway somewhere north of Amherst, Massachusetts.

This article summarizes the attraction.

Montague Bookmill is a hidden gem with books and beer, by Jon Mael (Boston Globe)

Part treehouse, part shopping center, part historical site, and part dining destination. The Montague Mill is impossible to categorize. But it’s entirely cool and timeless. Nice views, used books, and good food don’t go out of style.

The mill serves a diverse clientele including families seeking a fun day out, tourists, and college students longing for a quiet place away from the hustle and bustle of their busy campuses. Five businesses share the space on the banks of the Sawmill River, which flows into the Connecticut River a few miles downstream ...

In addition to the bookstore, there is a casual cafe, slightly upscale restaurant, record store and artists' collective, all situated in the old mill complex.

If memory serves, my beer choice was an IPA and a Porter, both from the region. The names weren't recorded and are lost to posterity. Perhaps I should have posted to untappd.

It was a relaxed and eclectic afternoon, and soon we returned home to dine on a meal of grilled beef, corn and tomatoes, washed down with cans of Hermit Thrush. Here are two photos of the bookstore cribbed from the Internetz:

And another one I took. The afternoon was so laid back that I couldn't be bothered to exercise the camera.

At some point in the evening, the husband of Diana's niece observed that a brewery nearby made a Rauchbier.

Sunday was going to be fun.

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Very different and both enjoyable: Elm City Brewing Company (NH) and Hermit Thrush Brewery (VT).

For the overview of the fourth day of our Eastern USA Road Trip 2016, go to NAC.

Eastern USA Road Trip 2016, Day 4: Lunch in New Hampshire, and a last look at Vermont.

Lunch was planned for Keene, New Hampshire, for the sole reason of it being located inside a state I've never visited, and thus in urgent need of adding to the "visit all 50 states" list. Among the ways to declare a state conquered is to drink a beer. This proved quite easy.

Elm City Brewing Company (founded 1994 in Keene) is part of a shopping mall in a renovated former factory called Colony Mill Marketplace. The bartender and midday regulars were friendly, and when the lunchtime crowd began subsiding, one of the customers told me the quality of the beer had improved with the arrival of a new, young brewer.

I've no way of comparing, and can say only that my two pints were thoroughly enjoyable, as was a nip of Diana's Hefeweizen.

First came a better-than-average Kölsch, then at the bartender's recommendation a seasonal Black IPA. For the most part, I don't drink Black IPAs, because for the most part, I think they're bogus.

However, I usually accept the earnest advice of staff, and the bartender was absolutely right. The Black IPA was balanced, absent any roastiness, and very good. It went wonderfully with my Buffalo wings.

After returning to Brattleboro for a late afternoon of movable food court roaming downtown, it finally was time to experience the Hermit Thrush Brewery. We'd parked the car in the nearby public lot in anticipation of carry-out beer. It proved to be a wise move.

To stupidly generalize, Hermit Thrush does Belgian-influenced sours. Yes, not all Belgians are sour, and the term "sour" has long since embarked on its devolution into the nonsensical. Still, it's stylistic shorthand and suitable for my purposes.

Evidently Hermit Thrush is renowned among the beer cognoscenti, and my wife who understands me very well refuses to believe that I did not know this all along. She persists in thinking that our stop in Brattleboro was for the sole purpose of my visiting Hermit Thrush.

It was not, I tell you. Absolutely not. However, since we were in town ... I'd peeked in the door the previous day, and saw a tasting room that is exceedingly rustic, as though the interior of a barn had been stripped and transported from countryside to city, then reinstalled in a commercial brick building where such decor would absolutely horrify the contractor who built the structure decades ago. Well, times have changed.

So, kindly permit me to fast forward and divulge the 5-star review I submitted to Facebook.

I came to Hermit Thrush Brewery determined to be annoyed by what I imagined would be a pretentious hipster vibe, and yes, elements of it are there, but the staffer was pleasant and knowledgeable, and the beers just lovely. To review a brewery is to ask the question, "how well do they execute their game plan?" Very well, indeed.

Two flights were sampled, in addition to a nip of the Gin Barrel Saison, which is outstanding.

Flight 1: Supah Phunk #5, Po Tweet, Hoppy Smalls and Party Guy

Flight 2: Silly Friar and three infused variants: Rosy, Minty and Sprucy

As of this writing, I still haven't researched the brewery's reviews and ratings, and probably won't. Don't ask me to provide a detailed review of the beers, whether consumed in flights or from the case of cans purchased to take home, which was gently depleted a tad while in Massachusetts.

The quality of the beers I tasted was uniformly excellent, and yes, you must enjoy "sour," and this shouldn't be a problem. Delicious, indeed, and there is no reason for me to leave the house for a couple of weeks, though I'll try to be judicious in my dosages.

An unexpected high point came upon striking up a conversation with a young man at the bar, who turned out to be an employee of Shelton Brothers, who'll be attending the importer's festival in Louisville this October. The world continues to shrink.

By the way, I really enjoy these Hermit Thrush beers ... and in closing, the hermit thrush is "a medium-sized North American thrush. It is not very closely related to the other North American migrant species of Catharus, but rather to the Mexican russet nightingale-thrush."

Just in case you were wondering, or bird watching.

The view (with beers) at Whetstone Station Restaurant and Brewery in Brattleboro, Vermont.

In Brattleboro, Whetstone Brook descends the hilly terrain, flowing beneath the railroad tracks (the Amtrak is very near), and meeting the Connecticut River just opposite Mount Wantastiquet over on the New Hampshire side.

Adjacent to the bridge at river's edge is Whetstone Station Restaurant and Brewery. A few years ago, three entrepreneurs took over the building after a previous tenant went out of business.

(They) set about the task of remodeling, revamping and revising the former Riverview into a newly designered industrial themed brewpub and casual dining spot. Today the Whetstone Station Restaurant and Brewery features an unparalleled array of homebrewed, regional micro-brewed and international beers complemented by a fresh and unique menu with an emphasis on small plates, comfort foods and grilled dishes, made using local products whenever possible.

It's hard to imagine a better location, and because of this, I had low expectations for the beer. That's why we drink them, because Whetstone Station's house-brewed "nano" beers were a pleasant surprise. The California Common and Session IPA were as good as any others I've had, anywhere, and waiting behind the brewpub's own taps is a fine guest beer list.

On September 1, we had beers at the rooftop beer garden, then took a table on the dining deck for another round or two with food.

My Facebook review:

Gorgeous day, great location. Helpful and friendly staff. Prices for food and beer are in line with similar eateries. House-brewed beers were solid; I particularly enjoyed the California Common available on the day of our visit, and the guest drafts were appropriately heavy on Vermont breweries, as it should be.

If we could have waited a couple of weeks, there'd have been autumn foliage, although getting a table at Whetstone Station might become difficult then.

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A hand-pulled pint at McNeill's Brewery in Brattleboro, Vermont.

Borrowed from Trip Advisor. 

I'm recapping our summer vacation, and the beer story goes here at PC, with further narrative at NAC:

Eastern USA Road Trip 2016, Day 2: Across Ohio and New York to Brattleboro, Vermont.

On Day Two, we drove from Cleveland to Brattleboro, Vermont, proceeding directly to our Airbnb lodgings. Once the flag had been planted, it was time to get our bearings and go downtown, perhaps a half-mile away, which brought us to McNeill's Brewery.

I've no idea what has happened at McNeill's since 2005, when the following article appeared, although a more recent on-line account suggests that little has changed apart from the plug being pulled from a second brewing facility owing to the owner's bout of bad health.

After reading Crouch's wonderful character study, it's perfectly clear to me why I liked this place so much.

Alternately brash, arrogant, kindly, brusque, and passionate, Ray McNeill, the owner of McNeill's Brewery, is an intriguing mix of personalities, by Andy Crouch (BeerScribe)

... When he opened McNeill's Brewery in a rundown building in downtown Brattleboro, a structure that once served as a police station, a town office hall and a jail, McNeill had a vision. "I was trying to create a sort of social meeting house for the town. You know that stupid television show 'Cheers'? That actually happens here. That's what this bar is like." The bar's insular atmosphere can prove challenging for outsiders. "Some of them get it right away and some of them don't," says McNeill. "Some people from out of town just figure it out right away. I've seen people from out of town, within twenty minutes, were on a first name basis with another half dozen people. If some people live in some real cloistered suburban place, they're probably not going to figure it out. But a lot of them do. If people don't know who I am, I certainly try and encourage that. If I see someone from out of town, I try and start a conversation with them right away. I go a little bit out of my way to do that."

Even before reading the preceding, I wrote a review of McNeill's on Facebook.

We stopped in McNeill's during the afternoon while visiting Brattleboro, and again the following day, and enjoyed it. Someone else said McNeill's is a dive bar with great beer, and to me, this is both accurate and commendable, because increasingly, pretentiousness kills the joy of "craft" beer. I had excellent cask pours, including a yummy Old Ale. The bartender was great; she treated us like family and offered spot-on advice about other dining and drinking options. Loved it for what it is.

My instincts are still fairly sharp, after all. One of the bartender's most enthused recommendations was Turquoise Grill, an intimate Turkish spot. My Lamb Köfte was outstanding.

One Brattleboro brewery down ... two to go.

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Helluva beer selection at Cleveland's Progressive Field; the price is high, but I can live with that.

As detailed at NA Confidential, we saw an Indians game while overnighting in Cleveland. The home side beat the Twins, and I enjoyed a humongous Italian-style sandwich, courtesy of the Fat Head's concession stand.

Eastern USA Road Trip 2016, Day 1: MLB, Minnesota Twins at Cleveland Indians.

When my cell phone died, I lost the few photos I took of the park, including the inspiring tableau of the Great Lakes Brewing Beer Garden just yards away from our seats on the third base side (opposite Fat Head's, with the Brew Kettle nearby).

The good news: Lots and lots of American-style "craft" beers ... and GLBC's beer garden is open until the end of the game, thanks to some sort of special license.

The bad news: $12.00 for approximate 19-oz pours, across the board. Domestic is $10 for the same size.

Still, I attended a competitive ballgame and drank Session IPA, Oktoberfest and Porter. A wad of cash was dropped ... but we all know about stadium pricing. It's an occupational hazard.

Thumbs up to the food and drink at Progressive Field. Ironically, our last road trip ballgame was in Minneapolis in 2014, and Target Field was favorable for better beer, too.

Just don't get me started about the perennially blundering Louisville Bats. A better nickname would be Swillocrats.

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AFTER THE FIRE: In the Red Room, we’re all left – right?

AFTER THE FIRE: In the Red Room, we’re all left – right?

A weekly column by Roger A. Baylor.

Have you ever had the feeling you’re being watched?

The sensation isn’t irrational, and it’s not paranoia. Rather, it’s the sneaking suspicion that you’re being toyed with, prompted, or set up.

Suddenly you’re confronted with a situation so weirdly surreal that surely a hidden camera is aimed your way, primed to capture your dumbfounded, flailing reaction for speedy editing into a YouTube video, to be greeted virally by the guffaws of the uneducated, addled masses.

My former manager at Scoreboard Liquors must have felt this way on the infamous day thirty-odd years ago when a complete stranger strolled in, pointed at the door to the rear office, and asked, “Do you mind if I go back there and change my pants?”

YouTube obviously didn’t exist back then, but Candid Camera did. The late Lloyd “Duck” Cunningham’s unprintable reply to the man’s request would have played well in syndication, with Allen Funt joyfully suffering the brunt of bleeped-out epithets.

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It brings to mind the time when my inbox disgorged a Yelp review notification. An customer identified only as Manny was deeply troubled.

A little while ago I noticed there was a room that had pictures of several mass murdering, genocidal, tyrannical dictators on the walls. As a customer what meaning should I take from that? In my opinion it seems to show support from the owner of New Albania of these tyrants?

I enjoy the pizza at NABC but I don’t enjoy the thought of supporting someone that idolized people like the pictures and posters you seem to proudly display. Maybe I misunderstand their meaning.

My initial reaction was confusion. Manny filed his one-star review under NABC Bank Street Brewhouse, although the alleged "shrine" prompting his consternation has existed for two decades not downtown, but at NABC’s Pizzeria & Public House.

Next came annoyance. Murderers, tyrants and dictators on the wall, in the Red Room?

If so, who had possessed the nerve to pull down my Commie regalia and replace it with fascist iconography – Franco, Mussolini, Idi Amin and Dick Cheney?

Of course, I soon realized he was referring to the usual Red Room stalwarts like Lenin, Che and Gus Hall. Fair enough, I thought. The political spectrum for crimes against humanity has a tendency to mutate, depending on where one is standing at the time.

Here was my reply.

It isn’t necessarily a misunderstanding on your part, but what I can tell you with certainty is there’s no idolatry on mine.

I remain a leftist, broadly speaking, having traveled in the East Bloc and USSR as a young man in the 1980s, but while I found these countries fascinating from a number of standpoints, they were not places I ever wished to live.

Your question is asked every now and then, and my answer always has been the same: The Red Room means whatever the observer wishes for it to mean: Kitschy poster art emporium, spoils of Cold War victory or a shrine of reverence.

However, the primary intent for me is for it to serve as a talking point to help keep a piece of still-recent history living, in the sense that with each passing year, fewer (mostly younger) customers have any clue what the era was about.

The verdict of history is fairly clear when it comes to the legacy of Stalin and Mao, and I have confidence that most interested parties will reach that conclusion, as you and I already have. But first they must be interested in history and motivated to investigate it. In my view, the Red Room periodically serves that purpose.

As for what I was thinking more than 20 years ago with regard to this tiny bejeweled dining space, my prime consideration at the time was to have a place to display the many propaganda pieces I’d hauled home from travels abroad.

One thing led to another, and there it was. The Red Room came together non-metaphorically. I’m the first to admit there is as little to idolize on Stalin’s part as Hitler’s, but to repeat, the point lies elsewhere.

Decades have passed and the older generations have departed. Precious little discussion takes place about the “-isms” dominating the entirety of the 20th century … and sorry, yonder Teahadists, but petulant ranting about Communism and Obamacare amid voluminous ricocheting spittle does not suffice as earnestness.

It remains that to forget history is to risk repeating it, as either Santayana or Carlos Santana once remarked. I’m in favor of reminders. If you ask me, local school children should visit the Red Room on their field trips.

The Red Room’s “meaning”?

It prompted a question from Manny about the Red Room’s meaning, simple as that, even if the real estate in question now lies outside my immediate bailiwick. May these historical inquiry instigators survive the business buy-out – if the blessed cha-ching ever occurs in my lifetime.

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Ironically, my single favorite example of work- and history-related consumer behavior occurred not in the comfortable confines of the Red Room, but at Bank Street Brewhouse, not long after it opened in 2009.

One of our servers was asked by a well-dressed while male customer to explain Roger’s political beliefs. The visitor had noticed the red stars and leftist imagery on the shiny new brewing tanks visible just past the dining room window.

Our man on the floor, who’d studied some history and political science in college, made a game effort to interpret these complex threads of geopolitics, economics and the art of brewing, and to phrase them in snappy sentences reproducible on bumper stickers suitable for a Lexus, and yet the customer remained unimpressed, writing this on his charge card receipt:

“Tell your Commie boss to share the wealth.”

In order to accentuate his displeasure with my cheeky political proclivities, this rather boorish scion of an identifiably Falangist regional family left the gratuity column empty, thus idiotically stiffing the server while doing me no harm whatever.

Classy, eh?

Not only that, but he was mistaken; in fact, I still share the wealth every day – in terms of knowledge, as teachers are wont to do, because I’ve always been more a teacher than a businessman.

In 2009, my advice to our server was this:

“If it ever happens again, tell him you don’t care what sort of ‘-ist’ Roger is, just as long as he keeps signing my paycheck.”

Seven years later, permit me to consciously refrain from associating the Republican Party’s nominee for president with any of these memories.

After all, The Donald would be just as clueless as Manny and the Stiffer when it comes to the history in the Red Room.

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August 22: AFTER THE FIRE: Drink, smoke and enjoy.

August 15: AFTER THE FIRE: Listening to "Dixieland" jazz, and thinking about drinking a beer.

August 8: AFTER THE FIRE: A pre-digital Bohemian vignette, 1989.

August 1: AFTER THE FIRE: The devil made me drink it.

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Give AB InBev the finger and read this article about antitrust and the importance of supply chains.

Beer is not mentioned in this article, but if you're reading it while drinking a Goose Island product, you're probably better off heading back to Thrillist.

What Role for Antitrust in the Era of Rising Inequality? The Importance of Power in Supply Chains, by Marshall Steinbaum (Pro-Market)

Concentration of power in supply chains is a prime mechanism by which dominant companies consolidate power and profits.

The Sherman Antitrust Act of 1890 was passed almost unanimously and with one goal in mind: to keep the cartels that dominated the nation’s railroad network from shaking down yeoman farmers. If they wanted to sell their goods, farmers had to pay the railroads’ exorbitant prices for freight, and any time demand increased, the railroads increased their prices and so captured the entire windfall. The Sherman Act, along with later U.S. antitrust legislation, aimed to diffuse market power in supply chains. The premise of the act was that individual small-scale producers should be allowed to make a living without paying powerful gatekeepers for the privilege.

For the most part, that has not been the standard applied by regulators and courts in enforcing antitrust law over the last four decades. Instead, they have looked almost exclusively at consumer welfare rather than the relative power of different suppliers to set prices and other trading terms. And policymakers and experts have tended to assume that large suppliers serve consumers’ interest by competing out inefficient producers—meaning that concentrating power in supply chains is, at least most of the time, beneficial to the public. That intellectual trend is reflected in the prioritization of different types of cases by the antitrust enforcement agencies, and also in the judiciary with the Supreme Court’s move to consider vertical price-fixing cases under the Rule of Reason following the 2007 Leegin case.

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