It would seem that Logyard Brewery has ‘quiet’ closed. Without fully telling anyone, or making any grand announcements on Facebook or other social media platforms; it would seem that Logyard Brewing out of Kane, PA has closed. The small but popular brewery from Kane, PA had a strong following online and in person for most of their run. They also canned and distributed slightly throughout the state, as well as appeared at several brewfests and events throughout the state (such as the Lancaster Craft Beerfest, and others).

Exterior of the Logyard Brewery (photo courtesy of Logyard Brewery’s website)

Logyard Brewery Has Closed

Its safe to say they have closed at this point. They have not been open in a bit, and workers have told residents of Kane that they have closed. I reached out to them via e-mail and have received no reply (with a wait time of six days). Its sad to hear as Logyard Brewing made some fantastic beers and was such a great spot for the locales. I remember visiting it with my daughters back in August of 2019, and we absolutely loved it. My (now 15 years old) daughter Lily still raves about the beer cheese from them.

Located at 20 Wetmore Ave, Kane, PA 16735, Logyard Brewery is just a few doors down from Twisted Vine Beverages (another brewery in Kane, PA).

As I alluded to earlier in the article, Logyard Brewing Company hasn’t made an official announcement of their closing – but workers have told residents in Kane that they have closed. There is also talk in Facebook groups (particularly local Kane groups) that they are officially closed. With one particular post in the “Things Happening in Kane PA” group, by a Katie Johnson on November 13th:

On behalf of Royce Novosel-Johnson and Tim Robinson:

Well, folks, our time has come. Logyard is now closed. Thank you for your support in the past, thank you to our families and wonderful employees that have worked with us over the years, and thanks for the memories. –at Logyard Brewing.

So for all appearances they have closed. Such a shame to see such a wonderful, beautiful, small town, community oriented brewery close down. They had some tremendous beers, a great atmosphere, wonderful staff, and fantastic food. They will be greatly missed.

2024 has certainly been a rough year, with a lot of breweries closing. Pennsylvania alone has seen several breweries close, and we still have over a month to go in the year. I’m also not expecting 2025 to be much better for breweries and the craft brewing industry. But you never know, fingers crossed, hopefully I’ll be wrong!

More Articles About Logyard Brewery

The following is a list of other articles we’ve written about Logyard Brewery:

• The Trip – Day 1 (August 2019)
• Logyard Brewing Releasing Giggle Water
• Logyard Brewing Releasing TILF – West Coast IPA
• Brewer Interview: Sean Gorzynski (Logyard Brewing)
• Beer Review: Prognosticator Pils (Logyard Brewing)
• Logyard Brewing’s Prognosticator Pils is the Official Beer of Groundhog Day 2022

For More Information on Logyard Brewery

The following comes via Untappd.

Logyard Brewing is listed as a micro brewery from Kane, PA. They have 173 unique beers and over 60,000 ratings with a global average rating of 3.76 (as of 11.15.24). Their Untappd description is blank.

You can follow them on these social media platforms:

• Logyard Brewing – Official Website
• Logyard Brewing – Facebook
• Logyard Brewing – Instagram
• Logyard Brewing – Twitter
• Logyard Brewing – Untappd

Logyard Brewing Giggle Water (photo courtesy of Logyard Brewing)

Logyard Brewing Releasing Giggle Water

Logyard Brewing is releasing “Giggle Water” a new, RTD (Ready to Drink – cocktail style drink). This variant is a Moscow Mule style RTD. It is a malt beverage with ginger and limes, and will be about 6% ABV. They are going to be selling it in 16 oz “pounder” cans.

They are also releasing “Climb it Activist”, a hazy double IPA that will be 8.3% ABV. It also will be released in 16 oz pounder cans.

Logyard Brewing

Logyard Brewing is located in Kane, PA. You can find their brewery at: 103 N Fraley St, Kane, PA 16735. Kane is near Kinzua Bridge – the famous railroad bridge that was half destroyed by a tornado, and makes for an excellent tourist spot and hiking area. You can read up on that here: History of Kinzua Bridge.

My oldest three daughters and I got to visit Kinzua Bridge and Logyard Brewing in 2019. Lily absolutely loved the beer cheese and the nachos at the brewery. Kane is a quaint little town, and very cute, and the brewery plays up the lumberjack, logging, and tree theme to perfection.

You can read about our trip here:

• The Trip: Day 1 Recap
• The Trip: Day 2 Recap
• The Trip: Day 3 Recap

For More Information on Logyard Brewing and Other Articles

The following comes via Untappd.

Logyard Brewery is a microbrewery from Kane, PA. They have 165 unique beers, and over 56,000 ratings, with a global average rating of 3.76 (as of 1.18.24). Their Untappd description is currently blank.

You can find them on the following social media pages:

• Logyard Brewery – Official Website
• Logyard Brewery – Facebook
• Logyard Brewery – Instagram
• Logyard Brewery – Twitter
• Logyard Brewery – Untappd

For more articles we have written on Logyard Brewery, check out the following:

• Logyard Brewing’s Prognosticator Pils is the Official Beer of Groundhog Day 2022
• Beer Review: Prognosticator Pils (Logyard Brewing)
• Brewer Interview: Sean Gorzynski (Logyard Brewing)
• Best in Beer – Farm Show Awards (2023)
• Farm Show Beer Competition – Best in Beer (2023) – Stats
• Logyard Brewing Releasing TILF – West Coast IPA
• Logyard Brewing Releasing Giggle Water

Our Trip:

• Going on the Road (August 2019)
• The Trip: Day 1 Recap
• The Trip: Day 2 Recap
• The Trip: Day 3 Recap

Thank You For Reading

If you like this article, please check out our other many articles, including news, beer reviews, travelogues, maps, and much much more. We greatly appreciate everyone visiting the site!

Cheers.

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As always, thank you everyone for reading! Leave your likes, comments, suggestions, questions, etc, in the comments section. Or use the Feedback – Contact Us – page, and we’ll get right back to you! You can also reach out to us at our direct e-mail address: thebeerthrillers@gmail.com

Thank you for visiting our blog. Please make sure to follow, bookmark, subscribe, and make sure to comment and leave feedback and like the blog posts you read. It will help us to better tailor the blog to you, the readers, likes and make this a better blog for everyone.

We are working on a massive project here at The Beer Thrillers. We are creating a map of all of the breweries across the United States. State by state we are adding maps of all of the different states with every brewery in each state. (We will eventually get to the US Territories, as well as the Canadian Provinces, and possibly more countries; as well as doing some fun maps like a map of all the breweries we’ve been to, and other fun maps.) You can find the brewery maps here:

• MAPS OF BREWERIES

We are also working on a project of creating printable and downloadable PDFs and resources to be able to check and keep track of all of the breweries you’ve been to. So stay tuned for that project once we are finished with the Brewery Maps of the US States.

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The Beer Thrillers are a blog that prides itself on writing beer reviews, brewery reviews, travelogues, news (especially local to the Central PA brewery scene), as well as covering other topics of our interests – such as hiking, literature and books, board games, and video games which we sometimes stream with our friends over at Knights of Nostalgia. We are currently listed as #7 on FeedSpot’s “Top 100 Beer Blogs” and #8 on FeedSpot’s “Top 40 Pennsylvania Blogs”. (As of January 2023.) Thank you for reading our site today, please subscribe, follow, and bookmark. Please reach out to us if you are interested in working together. If you would like to donate to the blog you can here: Donate to The Beer Thrillers. Thank you!

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2022 Official Groundhog Day Beer

The official beer of Groundhog Day 2022 is Prognosticator Pils by Logyard Brewing Company from Kane, Pennsylvania. Phil will even be at Logyard Brewing on February 5th from 5PM to 7PM to commemorate his prognostication.

Logyard Brewery’s beer the Prognosticator Pilsner has been named the official beer of Groundhog Day 2022. In recognition of that achievement, Punxsutawney Phil will be visiting the Logyard Brewery Taproom at 103 N. Fraley Street on Sat. Feb. 5 from 5 to 7 p.m.

“Punxsutawney Phil, also known as the ‘Prognosticator of Prognosticators’ is coming to KANE!” exclaimed Royce Novosel-Johnson, co-founder of Logyard Brewing. “All of our friends and local citizens know of Phil, but not many have ever ventured down to Punxsy to see him at 7 a.m. on Groundhog Day.”

Phil and his certified handlers — the fellows in the top hats — will be in the Logyard Brewery Taproom to mingle with visitors and celebrate the fact that the Prognosticator Pilsner has been selected as the official beer of Groundhog Day, which falls on Wed. Feb. 2 this year. Past designees of this award include Straub Brewery and Sam Adams, Boston Beer Company.

The Bradford Era – Logyard’s Prognosticator Pilsner Official Beer of Groundhog Day

Groundhog Day

Well… it’s Groundhog Day Again…. and this year, I’m making sure to cover it with Prognosticator Pilsner by Logyard Brewing Company. Who doesn’t love Groundhog Day? Movie or actual day/event. Maybe next year I’ll actually get to go out to the event and check it out, its certainly on my bucket list of things to do. I hear its a raucous party of fun, drinking, and possibly some prognosticating.

But, so here we find ourselves again, at another Groundhog Day, this time the 2022 edition of it. Phil certainly didn’t see COVID-19 / coronavirus on his radar and prediction in 2020, and didn’t see that 2021 would be much like 2020 (especially for me), but here’s to hoping he sees a good upcoming year.

…..And the results are in….

Six more weeks of stout season everyone. So bust down the doors of your cellars and get them bourbon barrel aged stouts ready, we got some more winter in store for us!

Beer Review

Of course I couldn’t just do a Groundhog Day beer review without throwing in Groundhog Day gif memes. Just like when I did the Scrooged IPA beer review, I had to throw in some Scrooged gif memes then as well. Same with my various Star Wars beer reviews as well. (And have no fear, just because I’m doing this beer review, doesn’t mean I’m forgetting that its Star Wars Wednesday, there will still be a Star Wars beer review today.)

Ok, lets get on to the beer review.

Beer: Prognosticator Pils
Brewery: Logyard Brewing Company
Style: Pilsner – German
ABV: 6%
IBU: 20
Untappd Description: Our version of this world classic has a smooth and crisp character from an extended lagering period. Brewed with imported German Pilsner, Vienna, and a touch of Wheat Malt. Perfectly balanced with noble German Tettnang hops and just a hint of Cascade for a modern American twist.

Logyard Brewing Company is a fun little micro brewery in Kane, Pennsylvania. I got to visit it back in the summer of 2019 when me and my daughters took our trip out west in PA, visiting Kenzua Bridge, and other great local areas. You can read about that here: The Trip (2019) – Day 1. Logyard Brewing (according to Untappd) has 101 unique named beers and has a total ratings of 32,239 with a global average rating of 3.78 as of 2.2.22, they have no Untappd description.

This is a smooth smelling, beer smelling, crisp, pilsner; and you get a good nose of it on just cracking the tab. This is a beer for men who like beer. This isn’t a super fruited, smoothy, juice bombed, with five thousand different adjuncts and purees thrown into it.

Which leads right into how this looks – this looks like a beer’s beer. A beer for men who likes beer. Like a good version of Miller Lite or Coors Lite. Its mostly clear, its mostly transparent, it has a nice decent ring of head to it as it pours out, and it leaves some lacing on the glass. The extra bit of hop gives it a bit more haze to it than say a normal pilsner would have, but it also brightens up the light straw coloring as well.

This is a smooth sailing beer that you can see the future in… even if it looks wintry. This is a sipper and a drinker, and could easily be a spring, summer, fall, winter beer. Good mowing the yard beer, and a good beer for watching a groundhog get yanked out of his stump and forced to either see a shadow or not. There is just a hint and twist of the hop in it that gives you some small level of bitterness, and some different add on flavors that you’re not going to get from your normal pilsner or lager which makes this interesting and refreshing at the same time. There is a light bread to toast taste, some mild honey, with a light crisp finish with a bit of the hop bitterness to go with it. A nice solid mouthfeel, nothing cloying, no aftertaste, and no off flavors. This is a perfect pilsner to get stuck reliving the same day over and over and over and over and over with…..

My Untappd Rating: ****
Global Average Untappd Rating: 3.77 (as of 2.2.22)

Numerologists Are Excited… The Deuces Are Wild

If you are a numerologist, today must be an exciting day, especially if two’s are your favorite number. Today is 2.2.22 (and later this month we’ll have 2.22.22, thats a bunch of two-twos or tutus). Always interesting to see these dates pop up (like 1.2.34 in twelve years, or 11.11.11 or 10.10.10 or 12.12.12, etc.). Some people say dates like these hold extra powers, like good luck or stuff, so who knows, maybe try out the powerball and see? But then again, I’m not a superstitious type of person (just a little stitious) (and working at a casino I see far too many of the super superstitious types), so I don’t really put any faith into any of this mumbo jumbo.

Working on Articles

I got a lot of articles working today. Wanted to have this one mostly done last night to go right first thing in the morning, alongside my Star Wars beer review for the day since it is Star Wars Wednesday and we got a new ‘The Book of Boba Fett’ episode today.

There is no way winter will end… for six weeks now, due to the pesky little groundhog Phil, but at least its not been a bad winter so far, like some previous years where hearing the call for “six more weeks of winter” felt like a deathknell. (Maybe I’ll do a stout review once a week for the next six weeks.) And at least there is always The Way of the Mandalorians…. (see how I segued that right back to Star Wars? ahhh… pretty good huh?) So be sure to check back in tonight or maybe this afternoon for the Star Wars beer review (no spoilers!). I will say, I was up at 4:45AM after falling asleep at only 1:30-2AM, so I’m kinda running on E right now, and I think thats why this article took so long to get out. (Also getting lots of calls and e-mails today), despite having the day off work. I will be busy from 1-4/5PM, but might get the review out before 7PM when I’ll be at Boneshire Brew Works tonight for Trivia. If I’m unable to get it out before we leave for trivia, I’ll have it after trivia (so 9-10PM). Be sure to be checking in to see when it hits.

In that spirit, make sure you check out our other popular culture and nerd culture beer reviews:

Nerd and Popular Culture Beer Reviews

Star Wars:

• Beer Review: The Pandalorian (Tattered Flag)
• Beer Review: Wookie Monster (Fourscore Beer Co)
• Beer Review: Out of Order: Blue Milk (RAR Brewing)
• Beer Review: Out of Order: Tatooine Tart (RAR Brewing)
• Beer Review: Out of Order: RAWRGWAWGGR (RAR Brewing)
• Revenge of the Fifth / Cinco de Mayo
• May the Fourth Be With You
• Beer Review: This is Nut the Fluff You’re Looking For (Fourscore Beer Co)
• Beer Review: This is the Way (Broken Goblet Brewing)
• Beer Review: This is the Whey (Bolero Snort Brewery)
• Beer Review: Java the Stout (Jackie O’s Brewery)
• Beer Review: The Mangolorian (Brewery Fire)
• Beer Review: BoBull Fett (Bolero Snort Brewery)
• Mead Review: The Meadalorian (Space Time Mead and Cider Works)
• Beer Review: Let the Haze Flow Through You (Black Flag Brewing Co)
• Book Review: The Jedi Path and The Book of the Sith (Daniel Wallace)
• Book Review: Guardians of the Whills (Greg Rucka)

Rick and Morty:

• Beer Review: Peace Among Worlds (Cushwa Brewing Company)

Space Balls:

• Beer Review: Moon of Vega (Equilibrium Brewery)

Game of Thrones:

• Beer Review: Game of Thrones: My Watch Has Ended (Omnegang Brewery)

The Simpsons:

• Beer Review: I Voted for Kodos (Second Sin Brewing Company)
• Beer Review: I Voted for Kang (Second Sin Brewing Company)

Back to the Future:

• Beer Review: Back to Reality (Three 3s Brewing Co)

Scrooged:

• Beer Review: Scrooge IPA (Iron Hill Brewing)

Groundhog Day:

• Beer Review: Prognosticator Pils (Logyard Brewing Company)

A Christmas Story:

• Beer Review: The Soft Electric Glow of Sex (RAR Brewing)
• Beer Review: You’ll Shoot Your Eye Out! (Eight and Sand Beer Co)

Pro Wrestling:

• Beer Review: Broken Skull – Stone Cold Steve Austin’s IPA (El Segundo Brewing Company)
• Beer Review: Macho Man (Couch Brewery)
• Beer Review: Royal Rumble (Funk Brewing)

Matrix:

• Matrix Monday

Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles:

• Beer Review: Terpenes in Time (BAREBottle Brewing Co)

Seinfeld:

• Beer Review: Jon Voight’s Car (RAR Brewing)
• Beer Review: Airing of Grievances (Black Flag Brewing Company)

Other:

• Beer Review: Super Villain (Urban Village Brewing Company)
• Beer Review: Pixels (Seminar Brewing)
• Beer Review: Villeinage (Elder Pine Brewing and Blending)
• Beer Review: Intergalactic Deals (Levante Brewing)
• Beer Review: Galactic Space Circus (Creature Comforts Brewing Co)

Thanks For Reading

As always everyone, thanks for reading! Any thoughts, reviews, questions, concerns, ideas, insights, etc, please be sure to let us know! We got lots of fun things in the pipeline, so be on the lookout and make sure to check back regularly here at the blog, and through our social media platforms!

Cheers!

-B. Kline

As always, thank you everyone for reading! Leave your likes, comments, suggestions, questions, etc, in the comments section. Or use the Feedback – Contact Us – page, and we’ll get right back to you!

Thank you for visiting our blog. Please make sure to follow, bookmark, subscribe, and make sure to comment and leave feedback and like the blog posts you read. It will help us to better tailor the blog to you, the readers, likes and make this a better blog for everyone.

Please be sure to follow us on our social media accounts – Facebook, Facebook Group, Twitter, Instagram, YouTube, and Influence. Please be sure to also follow, like, subscribe to the blog here itself to keep updated. We love to hear from you guys, so be sure to leave a comment and let us know what you think!

For more info: Logyard Brewing Company’s Prognosticator Pilsner the Official Beer of Groundhog Day 2022

The Official Beer of Groundhog Day 2022

Logyard Brewery’s beer the Prognosticator Pilsner has been named the official beer of Groundhog Day 2022. In recognition of that achievement, Punxsutawney Phil will be visiting the Logyard Brewery Taproom at 103 N. Fraley Street on Sat. Feb. 5 from 5 to 7 p.m.

“Punxsutawney Phil, also known as the ‘Prognosticator of Prognosticators’ is coming to KANE!” exclaimed Royce Novosel-Johnson, co-founder of Logyard Brewing. “All of our friends and local citizens know of Phil, but not many have ever ventured down to Punxsy to see him at 7 a.m. on Groundhog Day.”

Logyard’s Prognosticator Pilsner Official Beer of Groundhog Day (Bradford Era)

This Wednesday is Groundhog’s Day; the annual event where Punxsutawney Phil is awakened and we find out if he either sees his shadow or not. Find out if we get an early Spring or six more weeks of Winter. The annual event on February 2nd in Punxsutawney is usually a fun beer fueled event every year for locals, as well as tourists from all over traveling to Gobbler’s Knob.

Logyard Brewing Company’s classic pilsner – Prognosticator Pils – will be the official beer of the Groundhog Day (2022) festivities. Past breweries have included Straub Brewing and Sam Adam’s Brewery (Boston Beer Company).

Royce Novosel-Johnson was happy to announce that Phil and his handlers would be coming to the Logyard Brewery and tap room as well. “This is a great opportunity for anyone around our general area to see and meet Punxsutawney Phil. Stop-by to have a drink and meal, get a picture with Phil and enjoy our Taproom expansion’s many new indoor games.” (Johnson as per Logyard’s Prognosticator Pilsner Official Beer of Groundhog Day [Bradford Era]).

Logyard Brewing is located in Kane, Pennsylvania. You can find the brewery and tap room at 103 N. Fraley Street, Kane, Pennsylvania 16735. The brewery is a lovely place. Visited it three years ago during our August trip (me and my daughters), after hiking Kinzua Bridge and park. The girls loved it as well. (You can read more here: The Trip Day 1.)

For More Information:

• Logyard Brewing Company’s Prognosticator Pilsner Official beer of Groundhog Day 2022 (Bradford Era)

Thanks For Reading

As always everyone, thanks for reading. Be sure to stay tuned here at The Beer Thrillers for more news and articles about your favorite nearby breweries!

Cheers!

-B. Kline

As always, thank you everyone for reading! Leave your likes, comments, suggestions, questions, etc, in the comments section. Or use the Feedback – Contact Us – page, and we’ll get right back to you!

Thank you for visiting our blog. Please make sure to follow, bookmark, subscribe, and make sure to comment and leave feedback and like the blog posts you read. It will help us to better tailor the blog to you, the readers, likes and make this a better blog for everyone.

Please be sure to follow us on our social media accounts – Facebook, Facebook Group, Twitter, Instagram, YouTube, and Influence. Please be sure to also follow, like, subscribe to the blog here itself to keep updated. We love to hear from you guys, so be sure to leave a comment and let us know what you think!

This is the poll for the FACEs Conference – The Rock Division – Round One. You can vote once per day, and you can vote once per poll (there is a poll for each division in round one). Be sure to share and send to your friends and breweries to let everyone vote!

Voting runs until March 7th, 11:59PM (EST).

To read more about The Battle of the Breweries (2021) you can read the initial post here: The Battle of the Breweries (2021) – March Madness – The Beer Thrillers way.

Any questions, concerns, or comments about the brackets, or tournament, or breweries in question, you can leave in the comment section or message us directly through our Contact Page.

Please be sure to follow us on our social media accounts – Facebook, Facebook Group, Twitter, Instagram, YouTube, and Influence. Please be sure to also follow, like, subscribe to the blog here itself to keep updated. We love to hear from you guys, so be sure to leave a comment and let us know what you think!

The Battle of the Breweries (2021) – VOTING LINKS

Since this is the landing page post – survey, I will keep all of the voting links here for quick reference and jumping point, and so they don’t get lost in all the muddle.

• HEELs Conference:
  * Triple H Division: Round One
  * Ric Flair Division: Round One
• FACEs Conference:
  * Stone Cold Steve Austin Division: Round One
  * The Rock Division: Round One

(Updated: 10AM – March 1st, 2021. Continue on for the original introduction to The Battle of the Breweries [2021] – March Madness tournament – article.)

Who’s ready for some March Madness? Like everyone else, in March, that means we need to fill out some brackets! And we here at The Beer Thrillers are no different!

BUT….

Instead of filling out NCAA or college basketball brackets, we are doing our own take on it – The Battle of the Breweries (2021)!

The Battle of the Breweries (2021)

So how’s this going to work? Who all is invited? What all breweries are going to be in it? How many breweries? How’s voting going to work? Who decides whose in and whose out? Whats the seeding? Why is Rick such a jerk to Morty? Why is Jurassic Bark the saddest episode of Futurama ever? Why is it also B. Kline’s favorite episode? What does that say about him? Why is the sky blue?

Ok…. enough with the questions!

The procedure for this ‘tournament’ will be similar to most other March Madness style tournaments. Similar to the ones you’ve seen Untappd and Breweries in PA have done, but with a bit of a twist. Because we here at The Beer Thrillers have a terrible time making full fledged decisions, the list of competitors will be 48 instead of the normal 32.

How did I decide what breweries will be involved? Simple. Only breweries that I have physically visited in person. The voting is based on the brewery and their beers; but to be included on this list, I personally had to have been to one of their locations.

How is seeding decided? Thats also pretty simple, the seeding is based on global average Untappd ratings. So the decision of the seeding is out of my hands. Also, bonus, you can’t get mad at me for the seeding. “Why is X above Y? Why is Z below D?” Its all decided by Untappd.

So whats the tournament structure? One total grouping of 48 breweries (in lieu of teams), divided by two conferences of 24 each, which is divided further into a total of four divisions of 12 each. So break down is simple: 4 divisions of 12 each, with two divisions per conference, of 24 teams in each, for a total of 48 competitors / teams / breweries.

How did we decide on who is in what division? Simple – random number generator. I rolled the dice (a D4 to be exact, thank you to my old nerdy DnD days, I just ‘happened’ to have one of these lying about). Rolled the dice for each brewery to locate them into a division. If one division was understaffed and another overstaffed, I re-rolled until they were evened out.

Let’s Meet Our Competitors

So who all do we have facing off in this crazy free for all of brewing expertise? Quite an assembly of breweries actually. There are a heavy abundance of local (Central PA local) breweries but there is an assortment of breweries from my various travels and across a few states. We have a few breweries from the Rochester area of New York; some breweries from Maryland, a Delaware brewery, some from Ohio, one from Indiana, and one from Kentucky as well.

Surprisingly; it actually took a while to curate the list. At even 48 entries, I still had many more to include, and even removed a few to make it a bit more diverse. I wanted to try and make this as diverse as possible (so removed a local brewery for one out of state, etc.). Possibly in the future, maybe the 2022 iteration of this, or the 2023, who knows, it’ll expand to even more breweries.

This has taken up pretty much my entire night to create the list, and to roll the dice for their divisions, and then checking their Untappd scores to get them into the correct seedings. In the case of matching Untappd scores, I did make my own decision, and that was primarily based on my thoughts of their size, notoriety, branding; so there is a few judgment calls due to a few ties, but there isn’t too many of them.

Conferences and division names…. I had to decide on what to pick. I was going to go by hop names, but I saw at last second, that the Breweries in PA have done that this year, instead of their normal divisions based on geography, it appears they decided to use hop names for their divisions, so thats out. I debated doing Jedi and Sith for the conferences and then doing different Jedi or Sith Masters for the division names…. but… instead decided to go with WWF/E names due to WrestleMania 37 approaching.

So I present you two conferences. One is based on HEELs and one is based on FACEs. The names of the breweries are listed in the order of their seedings, and will have their location and their Untappd (global average) rating behind their names.

The Heels Conference

First up, is divisions one and two of the HEELS conference. Triple H and Ric Flair.

Division One: Triple H

• Fourscore Beer Company (Gettysburg, PA) (4.09)
• Urban Artifact (Cincinnati, OH) (3.90)
• Mad Chef (East Petersburg, PA) (3.79)
• Levity Brewing (Indiana, PA) (3.77)
• Swiftwater Brewing Company (Rochester, NY) (3.77)
• Braxton Brewing Company (Covington, KY) (3.75)
• Sun King Brewery (Indianapolis, IN) (3.71)
• Highway Manor (Camp Hill, PA) (3.70)
• Gearhouse Brewing (Chambersburg, PA) (3.68)
• ZeroDay Brewing (Harrisburg, PA) (3.69)
• The Ministry of Brewing (Baltimore, MD) (3.64)
• Black Forest Brewing (Ephrata, PA) (3.62)

Division Two: Ric Flair

• Dewey Beer Company (Dewey Beach, DE) (4.08)
• Rotunda Brewing Company (Annville, PA) (3.96)
• Yellow Bridge Brewing (Pittsburgh, PA) (3.88)
• Troegs Independent Brewing (Hershey, PA) (3.79)
• Twisted Bine Brewing Company (Mount Joy, PA) (3.79)
• Cox Brewing Company (Elizabethtown, PA) (3.71)
• Chatty Monks (Reading, PA) (3.71)
• Land-Grant Brewing Company (Columbus, OH) (3.70)
• Saucony Creek Brewing Company (Kutztown, PA) (3.70)
• Desperate Times Brewing (Carlisle, PA) (3.69)
• Couch Brewery (Pittsburgh, PA) (3.60)

The Faces Conference

The faces conference is made up of two divisions led by Stone Cold Steve Austin and The Rock. First up, is Division Three, Stone Cold Steve Austin.

Division Three: Stone Cold Steve Austin

• Ever Grain Brewing (Mechanicsburg, PA) (3.93)
• Idiom Brewery (Frederick, MD) (3.90)
• Breaker Brewing (Wilkes-Barre, PA) (3.85)
• ShuBrew (Zelionople, PA) (3.85)
• Wolf’s Ridge Brewing Company (Columbus, OH) (3.84)
• Liquid Noise (Marysville, PA) (3.84)
• Boneshire Brew Works (Harrisburg, PA) (3.83)
• Rough Edges (Waynesboro, PA) (3.82)
• Tattered Flag (Middletown, PA) (3.79)
• Rubber Soul Brewing Company (Hummelstown, PA) (3.74)
• Three Heads Brewing (Rochester, NY) (3.71)
• Mount Gretna Craft Brewery (Palmyra, PA) (3.58)

Division Four: The Rock

• Cushwa Brewing (Williamsport, MD) (4.11)
• Jackie O’s Brewery (Athens, OH) (4.02)
• Pizza Boy Brewing Company (Al’s of Hampden) (Enola, PA) (3.88)
• Mellow Mink (Mechanicsburg, PA) (3.84)
• Moo-Duck Brewing (Elizabethtown, PA) (3.83)
• Logyard Brewing Company (Kane, PA) (3.78)
• Molly Pitcher Brewing (Carlisle, PA) (3.75)
• Olde Bedford Brewing Company (Bedford, PA) (3.75)
• Taft’s Brewing Company (Taft’s Ale House) (Cincinnati, OH) (3.72)
• Isle of Que Brewing (Selinsgrove, PA) (3.69)
• The Church Brew Works (Pittsburgh, PA) (3.56)

Alright, that’s all 48 competitors. Tomorrow the brackets will be published and you will be allowed to vote on the first round matchups. Here’s where things get a bit screwy…. mainly because I don’t do math so good (sigh, sad subject, really, since I work at a job where I do math all day). Well, what really happened, is that I didn’t think through the breakdown. 32 breaks down easily for each round…. 48…. not so much. So…..

Week one will be divisions with 6 matches in each divisions. After that, the divisions will break for week two, and it will be by conference, with 6 matches in each conference. After this, we break apart the conferences, and do another 6 matches. This leaves us with 3 final competitors, for a triple threat for the ending.

So…. I kinda sorta walked myself into a corner…. and kinda… sorta…. walked my way out of it. Glad I chose to use wrestler themed people, so that the finale “Triple Threat” makes more sense.

*Smacks head* D’oh!

But anyway, there will be 7 days of voting for each round. With the final round taking the remainder of the month and ending on the 31st.

Voting

Each day you will be able to come to the site to make your votes in the polls. It will be set-up by IPS, so it limits you to voting just once per day per vote. You can vote as many times as you want per round, but only once per day.

Following each round, I will update the brackets and post them and make up the new polls for voting. Round one begins on March 1st, 2021 and will last until March 7th at Midnight, when it will then become the next round.

I suggest helping your breweries out and sharing the poll pages so that as many of your friends and brewery lovers can vote as well. Good luck to all of the competitors… err… breweries!

As always, please like us and follow us here and on our social media pages to stay up to date on The Beer Thrillers. We have plenty of content to check out, so be sure to stop by often to see what we have coming out. Beer reviews, brewery reviews, travelogues, events, news, and more!

Thanks for reading everyone!

Cheers!

-B. Kline

(Just a quick note, late addition on this, this is going to be a two-part article. First part a look-back at The Beer Thrillers articles of 2019, and the second part about our top beers, top breweries, and other happenings of 2019 for myself personally and the blog, and some of our friends in general. So make sure to check out both parts.)

So its the end of the year… end of decade even…. and thus its time to reflect back on where we came from, how we got to where we are, and where we are going. Humanity, since the inception of time, and creating of calendars and years and New Years Eves and New Years Days have always taken the last few days of each year to look back on their year, their life, and reflected, and thought about how they could better themselves, come up with “resolutions” for the upcoming year, and join in with friends and families as they ring in the new year. “New Year New You.”

We here at The Beer Thrillers are going to do something …. similar. Not fully introspective though, because we don’t take ourselves that seriously. But just a fun look back at the year that was 2019. I can’t speak for my co-writers, but I can say for me, personally, 2019 had its fair share of ups, downs, in-betweens, lefts, rights, diagonals, crosses, bounces, turns, jukes, and jives. But I’m still here and better for it all. But I’m not going to go on and on too much about myself personally.

Rather, I’m going to write about how the blog has done, where we started from, where we’re headed, etc. And yea, I’ll probably get a little personal. But nothing deep or philosophical or introspective. More along the lines of what were some of the best beers, breweries, or events I’ve done of the year. So don’t worry, the blog will uphold the Seinfeld idea of “Nobody learns, nobody grows, nobody hugs”.

I started this blog back on May 17th, 2019. (This year!) It was a Thursday, my girls (my daughters) were at school, I was bored, and trying to figure out what I’m doing / was doing. I needed something for my days off while the kids were at school, something that was fun, something I was passionate about, something that let me feel like I was being creative, using my talents, and something I knew about. I’ve been reading blogs, and news sites, and all kinds of things about beer for so long, and I have a lot of experience drinking… …and writing… that I figured why not combine the two? I was feeling like I was in a rut, my job is the same its been for the past seven years, I wasn’t doing anything outright ‘creative’ and needed an outlet for it, and we are in a review culture. I do all kinds of reviews all the time, in small nondescript and unimportant ways. Like reading books when I’m finished, I write up a review of them when I check them off on GoodReads. Same with Untappd, when I drink a beer, I write up a small (Tweet size) review of it. I also felt, I was in a unique spot to start this up. I was getting to a spot where I knew enough people “on the inside” or “in the business”, and I was also doing stuff beyond just being a consumer; like home brewing, growing hops, helping can at Tattered Flag, being engaged in conversations with home brewers and professional brewers a lot, that I felt like I could provide some interesting conversations and articles to the world.

Mainly…. I was looking to not be bored, and to do something I love doing – writing and drinking beer.

So I started the blog up on May 17th, 2019. Basically having no clue what I was doing. I started up using WordPress and here we are. Its still WordPress, albeit the ‘weaker’ version (fingers crossed come sometime the new year, I switch over to the more advanced version, where I have more control over the site and the appearance). I did a little bit of research, chose a name – which to be frankly speaking – the name “The Beer Thrillers” just popped up to me. Nothing too deep or crazy or interesting behind it. I was honestly conjuring up the idea that it would be me, and a few of my friends writing, thus the “Thrillers” and not “Thriller”. I thought me, Drew, Dan maybe, and a few others would all writing all kinds of blog posts and contributing. Maybe some of the insiders in the business I know too… …while this hasn’t happened exactly; I have enlisted friends and other writers over the year to help out. (More on that as I get to their participation.)

Outside of creating the home page and starting up the site, my very first article on the blog was a beer review of Troegs’ Scratch 375 – The CocoNator. As far as first time articles go, I have no problems with it. Counting the writing of my colleagues and fellow contributors and cowriters to the blog, we’re now up to 130 blog posts (this being #131). I definitely think I’ve come a long way from that first blog. But I also like to think I laid the foundation there. I set up a system for how the beer reviews (I do) are written, presented, and I hope they are written in a fun, interesting, educational, and most importantly entertaining way.

When I started this in May, I had just gotten a couple of cans from my shift manager at work – Jordan and used them a the base for my first few beer reviews. The CocoNator was quickly followed by two South County beer reviews – Painting with Light (May 19th) and Sundrifter (May 30th). Also during this time, from my recent volunteer work helping can at Tattered Flag I worked with and gotten quite a few of their cans (hard work and sweat at their brewery resulted in many cans of whatever beer was being canned that day, as well as lots of other cans they still had from past canning runs). Two of these resulted in the beer reviews of Boulangerie Stout – Imperial Churro (May 22nd) which was a collaboration between Derek Wolf of Wolf Brewing Co. and Tattered Flag and You Hoppin’ On Me? (May 24th).

I was trying to write fast, furiously, and get some articles out there as a starting blog, I knew content was going to be the main driving force (and still is). Quality content even better. Hopefully I provided the quality content. I guess thats all up to you guys to decide, but I like to think I did (or at least, like I said, hope I did). As you can see from my picture of the Imperial Churro; often times in the background or foreground or beside the beers you’ll see some of the recent books I’m reading, as well as my dog Leela – especially if I’m drinking at home where she typically has to get her nose into the business of all involved. On May 27th, I conducted a bit of a science experiment when I found an old (over a year old) Black and Blue Tastee from The Veil. I had gotten a four pack from one of my favorite bartenders – Chris – who had traveled down and muled some back up. I wrapped up May, my first month of writing for the blog, with my first beer review from a bar – Warwick Hotel – on May 31st with a beer review of Cinnamon Toast Crunch by Collusion Tap Works.

May finished, and my first month done; even if I had only started late in the month on the 17th, I felt accomplished with the blog. I published 9 total blog pages; which included the home-page, the author-bio page, the contact page, and other necessary background pages. Word was slowly trickling out about the blog, I was up to 59 visitors and 121 views. Not a bad first month – especially considering it was basically just two weeks (the 17th through the 31st). Lets say I was “pleased as punch” with the start of the blog. June was looking bright!

June started with a beer review from the Bissell Brothers Brewing Company – Baby Genius on June 3rd. Followed up by a bottle of LazerSnake by Three Floyds on June 9th.

On June 13th, I did my first multiple beer review, and my first beer flight review – from Troegs Independent Craft Brewing – of course. What other place would I do my first beer flight review? Troegs was basically my initiation into the craft beer scene when I was ….cough turning 21…. and was the start of my craft beer love. Troegs is still a wonderful brewery, a fantastic venue there in Hershey, and overall holds a definite soft spot in my craft beer loving heart.

June 14th ended up being my first “double blog post” day. Earlier in the day I had stopped in at Tattered Flag to pick up a four-pack, had a beer, and when home, wrote a review, and later that night, with my daughters, I stopped in at Boneshire Brew Works, had a beer, and did a review before bed. At Tattered Flag I had the Abra Collabra beer, and at Boneshire I had the Sunburst beer. A week later I did my first brewery review, when I took my oldest daughter to Gettysburg for the day to visit the battlefields and monuments. Before visiting the sites, we stopped for lunch at the Battlefield Brew Works. A day later I was back at Warwick for another beer and review – Manayunk’s King Crunch.

Around this time, looking to expand, I enlisted the help of a buddy and fellow craft beer aficionado and enthusiast, and Boneshire lover – Josh Doncevic. We had a few talks at Boneshire Brew Works, and we chatted on the Central PA Whalerz group, and discussed this and that and everything beer related, and I thought he’d be a perfect fit for the blog – and he is and still has been. And on June 27th, he took his plunge into the world of blogging with his first beer review Northmont by Yellow Bridge.

A flurry of beer reviews followed – Should Have Put Him in Custardy, a beer flight from Hershey Biergarten, helped close out June and start July with Josh’s review of Ectogasm. June saw the blog grow by massive leaps and bounds, we went from 59 visitors in May to 848 visitors in June with 1100 some views. July was looking to be a great month for The Beer Thrillers, and it certainly delivered some amazing beer reviews! Pink Guava, Inexplicably Juicy, Miami Vice, Old 51, Dillston, Saison and Hurry up and Wait, a beer flight from Tony’s travels up north at the Black Gryphon, Wolf Prints, and Mango Guyabano sWheat Tart.

On July 19th we launched our Twitter page. Which just a few days ago, we hit our 100th follower! (Time for me to plug in here and suggest everyone head over there briefly to follow us, then come back here.) On July 23rd we also started our Instagram page. I will be the first to admit that we don’t do as much with Instagram, primarily because I don’t know enough about it yet. Looking to learn more about it in 2020 and get that page going a lot more.

July continued with some more beer reviews like Enigma, Green Zebra and Next Coast, Good Walk Spoiled, another beer flight from Troegs, and Road Less Traveled. I ended the month by discussing my upcoming road trip with my daughters.

July also saw some fun and interesting events I got to do for the first time. I lost my Ffej of July cherry, getting to make it out to possibly the biggest, baddest, most sickest birthday bash / lawn party ever. Me and Drew also attended the Moo-Funk Home Brew event as well. July was certainly a fun month, but August was looking to be even better.

August started off with a bang, I took my daughters up north PA to visit Elk Country, then we visited Straub Brewery, then we went to Kinzua Bridge and after that stopped at Logyard Brewery and next door to it was Twisted Vine Brewery. That was Day One. Day two saw us hitting the Pittsburgh area. First at dawn we hiked McConnell’s Creek, then went to ShuBrew before going into Pittsburgh proper and visit the city where we did a whole slew of things like see Fort Pitt, take the Duquesne Lift, check out medieval Catholic relics, stop by a Jewish synagogue, see the outfield wall still standing, and we also checked out a few breweries like Cinderlands Warehouse, The Church Brew Works, and we finished the day staying at a motel right next door to Yellow Bridge Brewing. Day Two was a lot busier than day one, but just a much fun.

We didn’t slow down for Day Three. We had a whole host of driving to do on day three. We started at Bushy Run to watch the reenactment and check out the events, then went to the Alleghany Portage and Railroad Museum, and then went into Johnstown to see the Johnstown Flood Memorial and there we checked out the brewery Stone Bridge Brewing. From there we Staple Bend Tunnel Trail and then we stopped and paid our respects at the Flight 93 Memorial. On the way back home to the Hershey area we stopped at Olde Bedford Brewing.

Was a fun three days where we got to see lots of cool places, museums, memorials, monuments, and nine breweries to boot. Can’t beat that!

The beer reviews weren’t going to slow down in August either. Ghost in the Machine by Josh, a beer flight at Twisted Bine, Juicy Fruit sWheat Tart, and Caucus Race 6.0. Then shortly before my oldest daughter’s birthday I took her and my second oldest down to Antietam to see the battlefield there and on the way back home we stopped at Cushwa Brewing. Which I did a brewery review of.

They have since moved out of that building but they are still close by to the location. August still had plenty more beer reviews for you guys starting with Harrishire, Kettle Sour Series – Raspberry, Ghost in the Machine by B. Kline, Good Vibrations, and then I did a dual beer review from two beers I had at a Harrisburg Senators game – a Pineapple Kolsch and a Dry Irish Stout, Reve Coffee Stout, Rye for an Eye (my birthday blog post and beer), and that closed out the month of August. As for events in August, me and my friend Ming went to the Lancaster Brewfest and afterwards went to Mad Chef Brewing (my first time there) which was an overall fun event.

Moving onto September started with my cashing in my birthday taco coupon at Newfangled Brew Works and had a really tasty Kettle Sour from them. In September I wrote a piece for Breweries in PA and also posted it on my blog – the version on the blog is found here: Breweries Around the Outskirts of Harrisburg (9.6.19). It has become one of the most popular pieces on our blog, and I believe it has done very well for the Breweries in PA crew as well. Beer reviews certainly didn’t slow down: a flight of Levante and Tattered Flag beers, a flight of Troegs beers, Fresh Fest and Trail Day Pale Ale, a flight of beers from Mount Gretna Brewery, and Spundae.

September also saw me do our first listicle articles. With two – one celebrating our oldest posts – and one celebrating our most viewed posts. Followed by, as always, more beer reviews – Key Lime Pie, They Burn Them All Away, AuZealand, a flight of Ever Grain beer, Vanilla Ice Cream Stout, and a Sour Blueberry wrapped up September.

October started off with a couple of Boneshire Brew Works beers – Tried and True (Mango) and Iscariot. I then got to attend Dr. Alison Feeney’s seminar and event at Mid-Town Scholar “For the Love of Beer“. Afterwards I went to The Millworks and had a flight. I did a book review of Dr. Alison Feeney’s book – For the Love of Beer. We finally joined Facebook on October 17th, you can find our Facebook page here. We are now up to 154 followers on Facebook, hoping to grow more! Did a beer review of Salted Caramel Moo-Hoo next.

I was contacted back in September by Midwest Coast Brewing Company to do an advertisement article and announcement article about their brewery opening. And I think it turned out very well. This was the first time a brewery reached out to us and asked us to do a piece for them and I think it turned out very well. I did a bit of an interview with the owners / brewers, and talked about their brewery’s opening. This has led to Mellow Mink reaching out to us and inviting us to their place to check them out and do an article (January 2nd we’ll be doing that).

J. Doncevic did a review of Ekaunot by Barebottle. We then covered Rotunda Brewing Company’s rebranding of Irv’s Pub into Rotunda Brew Pub. Also did a news article on Pennsylvania breweries that won at the 2019 GABF. That was my first straight up news article for the blog.

More beer reviews: Athena, Sour Me Peach, Irish Table, Envie and Envie 4X, Yuengling’s Hershey’s Chocolate Porter, and to wrap up the beer reviews of October I did Fatum Series: Member Berries. We also covered Boneshire Brew Works’ 3rd Anniversary Celebration.

November was a crazy month for me. I challenged myself to doing 30 blog posts, one per day – MINIMUM, and I am proud to say I achieved that and met my goal. It was certainly daunting a task, but I did achieve it.

Here’s the list of my articles in November: Pumpkin Stout, St. Thomas, Walker Station Stout, a flight by ZeroDay, King Sue, Intergalactic Warrior, s’Mores LazaRIS, There’s Nuttin Butter Than a Nice Pair of Camo Pants, Secret Machine, Broken Heels, Animal Adjective, 556 Stout, Boat Drinks, a flight of Tattered Flag – Newfangled Brew Works – and Cox Brewing beers, Alpha Abstraction, Double IPA, Lager, Birra Di Levante, Tickle Parts – Passionfruit, a flight of beers from Appalachian Brewing Company, Default Brewing, Darwin’s Salted Forehead, Newfangled Pils, Gotta Get up to Get Down, Paradise Lost, Moon of Vega, Citraquench’l, Azathoth, a flight of Troegs including Mad Elf, and finally a review of Official BBQ and Burgers – Pizza Boy’s second location. WHEW! That was a lot to get out, you can read about it in the November Recap.

November also saw Default Brewing join us here at The Beer Thrillers. Headed by AJ Brechbiel, they are a group of home brewers who will be providing home brewing articles for the blog from time to time. They gave us a welcoming post in November: Cheers from Default Brewing.

I also started up a collaboration with Let Us Drink Beer blog. Where we would be guest writing and contributing to each other’s blogs occasionally. They are down south, and with us being here in PA, it seemed like it’d be a nice fit. Provide some information and beers and breweries that readers might not normally get to see. They posted their first article “Five Must See Breweries in Atlanta” in November.

Josh also wrote two beer reviews in November: Ghost 782 and Ghost 779.

December started off a little slower here for us, probably because I was a bit tired from November, or perhaps just because its the holiday season, I don’t know. But my first beer review was Ice Dreamz. I did a few more beer reviews in December – My Watch Has Ended, The Hog, Scrooge IPA, Sap, and Autumn.

Default Brewing gave us an introduction to their crew: “Meet The Crew at Default Brewing“.

I covered the guest blogging that was going on and Let Us Drink Beer gave us a review of Koki Bunni.

Finally, the last article posted in all of 2019 (outside of this one now) was a travelogue of me and Drew brewery hopping around Harrisburg. Starting at Boneshire Brew Works, and going to The Vegetable Hunter, The Millworks, The Sturges Speakeasy, and ZeroDay Brewing. Was a fun day jumping around from place to place.

Hopefully you enjoyed this look back on 2019 with The Beer Thrillers. The second part of this article will most likely be posted January 1st, possibly before work, possibly after work. I have to leave for work now, and work until (at least) 8PM, and will most likely be going right out to enjoying New Years Eve festivities with my daughters. Tomorrow I work 10-6, and afterwards will be doing a podcast with Esteban about LOST.

The second part of this series will cover top beers, top breweries, and other things about the year for The Beer Thrillers and myself. For example – podcasting.

So make sure you check out part two then as well!

As always, I hope you have a Happy New Year, enjoyed the blog, and continue to do so! Without you, we don’t need to write, so we hope you are having as much fun and entertainment with this as we are!

-B. Kline on behalf of The Beer Thrillers staff.

I got to pick up this book by Dr. Alison E. Feeney last Thursday at the Mid-Town Scholar ahead of her panel discussion (alongside Hannah Ison, Jeffrey Musselman, and Sara Bozich). You can read about that here: “For The Love of Beer – Panel Discussion“. It was a fun and entertaining (and informative) night at the Mid-Town Scholar getting to listen to the three of them discuss breweries, beer, brewing, and community.

And that is the heart of this book. Communities. Even moreso than the breweries this is ‘about’, the heart of the book though is communities. And at the heart of a lot of communities, and growing, is craft breweries. Breweries, in particular craft breweries, are the seat of many things in communities now adays. Places like Boneshire, Moo-Duck, Troegs, and many other breweries that give back to their communities through charities and other activities. Breweries like ZeroDay and Millworks that act like centerpieces for revitalization of downtown areas.

There is so much to love about craft breweries and what all they do (and can do). And Dr. Feeney’s book covers that so well. From revitalizing downtown areas, or old historic buildings, to providing a center and a place for a community, to being an employment opportunity for the local town, to sustainability and environmental help, providing spent grain for local farmers, to helping charities, to hosting events, to having delicious food, to having local ingredients, etc, there is so much that breweries do for their local communities.

Dr. Alison Feeney has traveled all across Pennsylvania checking out various breweries, hop farms, malts, grains, communities, universities, etc, and has gotten a feel for the state, its history, its brewing industry, and the breweries and the people. She’s interviewed tons of people, she’s talked to customers, brewers, hop growers, home brew shop owners, just about everyone you can think of attached to the industry.

The book covers a lot of different breweries across the state. From big to little. From regional powerhouses like Victory and Troegs to smaller localized shops like Moo-Duck, Boneshire, Bonn Place, etc. She has traveled all across the state, all of the regions covered.

There is a wealth of information in the book detailing the history of beer, the history of brewing, the history of Pennsylvania, and brewing and beer in Pennsylvania, as well as a wealth of information and knowledge on brewing, the beer industry, and hops and other things in general. There is a ton of information on the breweries she’s visited as well, small details like the beers they have, or the information on how they restored the buildings they occupied, or little bits and info on the brewers or their styles.

The book is filled with pictures and images from all assortments of things, like hops, to the various breweries, to beer, to the workers at the breweries, to signs, to locations, etc. These pictures help fill in an overall image and idea of the breweries from across the state for those who haven’t gotten to visit them yet. Also with each brewery mentioned there is a small map of Pennsylvania showing where its located with an actual address as well. Its not a complete map of every brewery, and Dr. Feeney even states at the beginning that she isn’t providing a comprehensive listing of every brewery in PA as it’d be out of date before the book even saw print. Case in point – the book mentions Harty Brewing which has since folded up (relatively recently). But don’t let that fool you, this book is chock full of information and knowledge about PA beer and breweries.

At the beginning of the book is a note saying that a portion of the proceeds of the book are going to animal shelters and local places for animals. After this is the chapter previews which list which breweries are mentioned in which chapters and provides an outline for the book. Early chapters discuss beer and the history of it, progressing from Europe and Africa and Asia to America. Detailing the early pioneers to America and bringing beer over on the Mayflower, etc. It then discusses the history of beer and brewing in Pennsylvania.

Following this is how breweries affect communities, how they revitalize communities and buildings, and a chapter on historic buildings and how breweries are reusing old buildings. A chapter on the sustainability and environmental issues and help that breweries are doing and then a closing chapter on looking forward.

This book is a good read for anyone interested in beer, brewing, and especially for those interested in the craft breweries of Pennsylvania. She has provided lots of knowledge on the inner workings from the beginning to the present day on just about every tangential topic with the beer industry. I would certainly recommend this for anyone looking to learn about brewing and beer in Pennsylvania or just loves reading about breweries in Pennsylvania.

My GoodReads Score: ****
Global GoodReads Score: 4.00 (two ratings, three now, as of 10.9.19)

This was the first book review on the blog, hopefully you all like it, I know its a bit different then the beer and brewery reviews. But I am looking forward to doing a few more of these as I have a lot of beer books to read and go through. This is combining two of my loves – literature / books and beers, so this is definitely a double-win for me getting to review books about beer here for the blog. So if you are interested in this, let us know! Also if you have any beer book recommendations, be sure to leave them in the comments!

Thanks and cheers all!

-B. Kline
My GoodReads review link can be found here: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show/3007622590

This is going to be a very quick recap of Day 1 of the trip. Sorry I’m not getting to write a full comprehensive post detailing the breweries, but I will be writing up a review of each brewery in due time. Internet is spotty and trying to get this done, plus, doing a vacation trip with three girls all under the age of 12 by myself, doesn’t leave much time for writing up blog posts.

So suffice to say, here’s the quick Day 1 Recap:

Started off going to Elk Country Visitor Center (saw no elk, but did see a chipmunk), then we stopped at Straub Brewery. From there we went to Kinzua Bridge. After Kinzua Bridge we went into the town of Kane and hit the brewery of Logyard.

Much to my astonishment there was a brewery right next door, Twisted Vine Beverages, so we stopped there as well. (It was literally two buildings over in a row of buildings that all pretty much connected.)

We then drove to Clarion River Brewing (which is two minutes from the Motel 6 in Clarion that we are spending the night in). Unfortunately, the websites I used for information on the brewery listed the closing time as 10PM but when we got there at 9:40PM the brewery was closed (lady inside putting the chairs on the table, though there was still people at the bar, the doors were locked). So we missed out on Clarion River Brewing, but did get an extra 40 minutes in the luxurious Motel 6 of Clarion…..

Now onto Day 2 of our trip which will begin at McConnell’s Mill Creek and work our way into Pittsburgh before finding us going towards Bushy Run for day 3!

-B. Kline

August Road Trip Series:

• Going on the Road
• The Trip: Day 1 Recap
• The Trip: Day 2 Recap
• The Trip: Day 3 Recap