I first became interested in craft beer in 2003 while discussing different beers with my colleagues in the office. We started bringing in beers to share on Friday afternoons. I remember one of the first beers we talked about was Brother Thelonius by North Coast. That was the first time I realized that beer was not just something you consumed and hopefully enjoyed - it was also something worth discussing.
After a while, we expanded from shared 4-packs on a Friday afternoon to visiting bars in Chicago known to have big selections of good beers. Some of my earliest memorable tap house visits were Hopleaf and the Map Room. A few years later, I put together a beer club at work and organized some after-work tastings. We continued to visit local bars and expand our palates. At some point in that first decade of the new millennium, I coined the name 'Newton Beer Society' for the events I was organizing.
Bill Barnes and I at a Newton Beer Society meeting at Hop Leaf, circa 2009.
At that same company, I had a boss who was really into beer. He brewed his own and invited me over one Saturday to help out. He also invited me to a memorable tasting event the night before an annual Three Floyds Dark Lord Day festival. I remember being blown away when tasting The Breury's Black Tuesday. The quality of beers at that tasting greatly expanded my horizons and deepened my appreciation of the craft.
When I started a new job in 2012, I started up another beer club in the office. I also got the company to purchase kegerators and we started ordering kegs so there was good beer on tap regularly. I continued to organize tastings, and we even got reps from Dogfish Head and Maplewood to sponsor tastings. This lasted until the pandemic, and then the work-from-home mandate brought an end to the office beer club.
Covid may have finished my work beer club but it was the start of a neighborhood beer club, affectionately named SABBS for Saturday (or Sunday) Afternoon Beer and Bullshit). I have been very fortunate to live in a neighborhood surrounded by beer lovers. This has helped me continue to nurture and expand my love of beer.
That boss who brewed and hosted the memorable tasting before Dark Lord Day? That was Dave Dahl, a founder of Lo Rez brewing. Both he and I had careers in IT for many years, but he had a goal of getting out and starting his own brewery, which he did in 2016. My day job is still in IT, but I increasingly find myself thinking of doing something in the beer space, like opening a tap room. Starting this beer club allows me to stick a few toes into this space without jeopardizing the financial stability of myself and my family.
- joel
PS. I'd like to give a shout-out to Kinney Baughman, a professor from my college days at Appalachian State. Back in '92, Kinney gave me a crash course in how to create web pages in a text editor, and that's still my preferred method, 30 years later. Kinney was and is an important figure in craft beer in the N.C. Appalachian area. He brewed at the Tumbleweed brewpub in the early 90's, the 6th brewery in the state and is credited by Michael Tonsmiere in American Sour Ales as brewing the first post-prohibition sour beers in the U.S. Cheers, Kinney!
