TOPIC:

That's fantastic, Adeptus. Is there any way of finding out what happened to these breweries: when they ceased production, if they were taken over, etc?

Lewis gives very little informaiton, with the exception of a few places where he lists who owns it, whether they make Ale or Porter, and occasionally a little about when they started. I started putting all of these onto a map last night with the place name, county, Lewis's description and my own comments, but my software crashed and I lost it all! Gah!

As to more detail, I hope that once a map of locations and a list is available, members who are local to the areas might be able to find out more. I do have access to a load of journals here (my wife's archaeology library) but as you mentioned, local libraries are probably the best source for some of the information.

So, lets see how things go once I have the core datasets and lists ready. I have to think of the best way of presenting this stuff too... At the moment I'm thinking of three layers of information. One for Lewis, One for the NIAH, and one for the 6" mapping data. The three will overlap to an extent. I have at least 77 from Lewis alone, but finding the precise location is not always possible. The other two will have precise locations, but probably not much other information.

Hi Barry, it sounds like you have enough there for a publication in some historical or anthropological journal yourself! What you seem to have done is the kind of thing I sometimes think about doing, but nothing ever comes out of it! <!-- s:oops: --><img src="{SMILIES_PATH}/icon_redface.gif" alt="" title="Embarassed" /><!-- s:oops: -->
Well Done!

Ah, it was just a matter of the Joeby's question sparking off something I thought about doing before, especially considering my profession deals with maps! And having worked closely with DoEHLG and OSI for many (many!) years, I just happened to know where some short cuts are <!-- s:D --><img src="{SMILIES_PATH}/icon_biggrin.gif" alt="" title="Very Happy" /><!-- s:D -->

I'll try to identify further sources once those three are done.

I happened across a reference to a list of breweries in operation in 1920 from a book titled "[b:3ftxz0ek]Modern Irish Trade and Industry[/url:3ftxz0ek][/b:3ftxz0ek]", by E. J. Riordan, published in 1920. See page 159 for the original list, part of a chapter which lists output from the brewing industry in Ireland around those times.

I've reproduced that list below, and will include it in whatever form this piece of research will take in the end. In total, he listed 24 breweries. Things have changed!

Stuff in [i:3ftxz0ek][square brackets and italics are my comments][/i:3ftxz0ek]

[quote:3ftxz0ek]
The following list contains the names of most, if not all, of the breweries operating in Ireland at the present day. My reasons for inserting this information is that, as will be seen, many of these breweries have been in existence for a considerable number of years – several of them for more then a century. The names of the firms, with the exception of the first mentioned, have been arranged in alphabetical order, not in the order of their respective size of output.

The firm of Arthur Guinness, Sons & Co., Ltd, of Dublin have the largest output of any brewery in the world. It has been estimated that they brew more than two-thirds of all the beer brewed in Ireland and over one-twentieth of all the beer brewed in Great Britain and Ireland. The originators of the present firm purchased this brewery in 1759, but it actually established as a brewery for many years prior to that date.

Other Irish Brewers are :

Beamish and Crawford Ltd.;
The Cork Brewery, Cork, established about the year 1751;
Thomas R. Caffrey, The Mountain Brewery, Belfast, established about twenty years ago;
The Castlebellingham and Drogheda Brewery Co. Ltd., which owns breweries in both of the towns from which the Company take their title – the first named establishment early in the eighteenth century, thand the latter in 1825;
Cherry Bros., Creywell Brewery, New Ross, Co. Wexford, established 1830;
John D'Arcy & Sons, Ltd., The Anchor Brewery, Dublin, established in the year 1740 [i:3ftxz0ek][apparently this was on Usher Street and was wound up in 1926, and the most of the premesis was bought by the Dublin Corporation in 1933][/i:3ftxz0ek];
Davis Strangman & Co., Ltd., Waterford, established at the end of the eighteenth century;
Deasy & Co., Ltd., Clonakilty, Co. Cork, established about 1800;
W. J. Downes & Co., Enniskillen, Co. Fermanagh;
P. & H. Egan, Ltd., Tullamore, Kings County [i:3ftxz0ek][that's Offaly these days][/i:3ftxz0ek], established in 1852;
The Great Northern Brewery Co., Ltd., Dundalk, established in 1897;
Patrick Kiely & Sons, St. Stephens Brewery, Waterford, established about 1800;
George H. Lett, Mill Park Brewery, Enniscorthy, Co. Wexford, established in 1810;
McArdle, Moore & Co. Ltd., Dundalk, Co. Louth, establsihed at the end of the eighteenth century;
McConnell's Brewery, Ltd., Belfast, established about twenty years ago;
The Mountjoy Brewery Co., Ltd., Russeel Street, Dublin, established in 1852;
Thomas Murphy & Co., Ltd., Clonmel, Co. Tipperary, established in 1798;
James J. Murphy & Co., Ltd., Lady's Well Brewery, Co. Cork, established 1856;
Robert Perry & Sons, Ltd., Rathdowney, Queen's County [i:3ftxz0ek][which is now Laois][/i:3ftxz0ek], established about 1800;
E. Smithwick & Sons, Ltd., The St. Francis Abbey Brewery, Kilkenny, established in 1710;
The St. James' Street Brewery, Kilkenny, established in 1702;
Watkins, Jameson, Pim & Co. Ltd., Ardee Street, Dublin, established in 1736;
Wickham & Co., Wexford, established about 1800.
[/quote:3ftxz0ek]

and I just realised that a text file of this document is also available, so I could have saved the time typing and had another beer instead!

Also, a piece of history from a more recent brewery that also disappeared, The Dublin Brewing Company[/url:3ftxz0ek], which lists a few more Dublin-based Breweries, as well as some reasons why the majority, if not all, of the breweries disappeared under the weight of Guinness. The most shocking quote being

[quote:3ftxz0ek]Part of the Guinness strategy was whenever a small brewery closed or was bought out by it, its sales representatives were sent out to buy up all the memorabilia/posters etc. from the pubs that were previously supplied by that brewery. In that way it could remove the history of that company from the popular imagination. Stalin employed similar tactics in Russia after the revolution, by removing people from photographs who had fallen out of favour with the new regime. Their history could be erased and they no longer officially existed. [/quote:3ftxz0ek]

I know this was a marketing website from the DBC, but... <!-- s:? --><img src="{SMILIES_PATH}/icon_confused.gif" alt="" title="Confused" /><!-- s:? --> did they really do that?

Wow. I'm surprised how few there were, and how many I've heard of.

I had no idea that Great Northern was once a separate entity -- it really was "their thing" back then <!-- s:D --><img src="{SMILIES_PATH}/icon_biggrin.gif" alt="" title="Very Happy" /><!-- s:D -->

Deasy's, as you may know from the Porterhouse menu, was the brewery that made Wrassler's XXXX.

For so many of the businesses, brewing seems to be a sideline. I only ever knew McConnell's of Belfast as a distillery (thanks to Uncle Arthur's men, presumably), mainly from mirrors in pubs.

And check out everything Egan's were up to in this article[/url:17zip51m]: tea, tobacco, bacon, and bottling for other breweries as well.

[quote:17zip51m]We congratulate the firm upon their determination to secure for themselves a share of the ale trade for the city and provinces, and assure them that there is plenty of room for business with such a high-class article as theirs on the market. We saw samples of the several qualities of ale brewed by Messrs. Egan, and all were as sparkling in appearance and as palatable as any ale we have ever seen or tasted. The four qualities of ale, with their prices are strong-bitter ale, 48s. per barrel ; family bitter ale, 36s. per barrel ; strong mild xx ale, 48s.per barrel; single mild ale, 28s. per barrel, less usual trade discount.[/quote:17zip51m]
This is gold, Adeptus. Pure gold.