Stroh's returns to Detroit with a new beer, but pride never left
Stroh's means more than beer to people connected to the brand with deep Detroit roots
The day the Stroh's plant closed in Detroit, a lab technician and his coworker climbed atop the tallest building at the historic brewery and lowered the American flag to half-staff.
"In our minds, we were mourning the death of the brewery, and it seemed a fitting tribute," recalled Steven Lees. It was May 31, 1985.
On Monday, Detroit-made Stroh Brewery Co. beer returns to stores and bars across Michigan. The Bohemian-Style Pilsner (5.5% alcohol by volume) is made by Brew Detroit in the Corktown neighborhood through an agreement with Pabst Brewing Company.
Pabst acquired the brand in 1999, and the Stroh family no longer has a hand in the product.
"I don't care who's making it, just that they're back in Detroit where they belong," Lees said. "I'm thrilled. I think it's awesome."
Numerous former employees share his sentiments, as does at least one Stroh.
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"Re-launching an old Stroh's recipe from the 1850s is a brilliant move on Pabst's part, and comes at the perfect time in Detroit's trajectory," said Frances Stroh, 49, a San Francisco-based writer.
The iconic Stroh Brewery Co. at one time was the third-largest brewing company in the U.S. For many who lived in and around Detroit during its heyday, Stroh's is enshrined in the city's identity.
'The best job we ever had'
Stroh's is far more than a cheap beer brand for three lifelong friends who met as tour guides in the 1970s at the iconic brewery on Gratiot Avenue, just east of downtown near the Eastern Market, in what is now known as Brewery Park..
Dr. Bernhard Johnson, a dentist; Wayne County Circuit Judge James Chylinski and Kirtland Products CEO Leon Tupper all donned the white, button-down shirts and thin black "Stroh's" ties during their college days as guides for the popular public tours of the plant.
"Ask any of us: That was the best job we ever had," said Chylinski, now 67.
He recalled the fire-brewing equipment "like flame throwers" sending 10- to 15-foot-long flames on big copper kettles holding thousands of gallons of brewing wort.
The men said the Strohs were good people to work for. Despite racial tensions in Detroit at the time, they employed a diverse group of people "working in harmony," said Johnson, 69, who is black.
"They were there to support these students on their journey," he said. "We were all just tour guides trying to work our way up."
The free tours included a stop in a German-style rathskeller with wooden seating and tables, where the guides would serve cold cuts. If someone had a question they couldn't answer, the brewer was always available to answer it.
Lees, who started with the brewery in 1983, began as a temporary employee and soon became a lab tech in the quality-assurance department. He said he made good money and, "if you were sick, they called it an 'instance,' and you wouldn't just take a day off, you'd get three days off."
For Christmas, employees got to pick an item out of a catalog; one year, he got a cooking wok.
"I think everybody that worked there was proud to work there," Lees said.
Frances Stroh said her great uncle John Stroh, who ran the company for about 30 years, was known to walk the brewery floor and greet every employee by name.
"I always remember a relaxed, friendly atmosphere when I'd visit the brewery as a child," she said in an e-mail.
Tupper said the guides in the early 1970s were allowed to study at work if they finished their tasks — and even still get paid if a scheduled group didn't show. And the guides got to drink as much beer as they wanted.
"But if you got drunk, you were fired," Chylinski said, recalling one guide who was drunk the first week and wasn't kept on staff very long. "It was a matter of discipline."
There was a camaraderie among the staff, and these three met up recently at the Mexican Village restaurant in Detroit to talk with the Free Press about their memories. They said that over the years, they've kept in touch and gone to each other's weddings.
"It was an incubator," said Tupper, 66.
Johnson uses two words to describe Stroh Brewery Co. during his time there: "First class."
Deep Detroit roots
In 1850, German immigrant Bernhard Stroh started the company that would become Stroh’s, selling beer “door-to-door out of a wheelbarrow,” Frances Stroh said in her book, "Beer Money," released earlier this year. The book reveals her perspective of the company's decline and her family's personal challenges in the late 20th Century.
As Peter Blum wrote in his “Brewed in Detroit” book, the brewery during Prohibition was Detroit's only one licensed to make low-alcohol near beer, which involved removing alcohol from full-strength beer. When the national ban on alcohol was lifted in 1933, the brewery already had full-strength beer ready for packaging, giving it a head start on competition.
Stroh Brewery Company's ownership was passed down through generations of the Stroh family as, by the mid-1980s, it acquired Schlitz Brewing and grew to the third-largest brewing company in the U.S. The brewery over the years sponsored the Detroit Tigers and Red Wings, as well as the Grand Prix and the Detroit River hydroplane races.
But by the late 1990s, the fortunes declined. Among the issues were the debt from the Schlitz purchase, competition and a flattening of industry sales overall, according to Frances Stroh's book.
The original Detroit brewing location closed in 1985, as it was "landlocked and unable to expand operations to meet growing demand," according to the Stroh's website.
Lees said that the day it closed was somber, and many people brought cameras to work to capture the history.
"It was a sad time, really, not just because many of us were about to lose our jobs, but because it was the end of Stroh's in Detroit, the end of an era," he said in an e-mail.
He'd wanted to take one of the big, red lightbulbs from the "Stroh's Beer" sign atop the tower as a memento. He was thinking about taking one off the sign, but instead, one of the workers gave him a burned-out bulb.
Lees said that the day they lowered the flag, "I don't think it stayed down." Someone later climbed up and raised it again.
Stroh's beer timeline
1775: Stroh family begins brewing at a small Family Inn in Kirn, Germany.
1849: Bernhard Stroh, who had learned the brewing trade from his father, immigrates to the U.S., during the German Revolution.
1850: Bernhard Stroh establishes his own brewery in Detroit. Stroh names his new company Lion's Head Brewery, adopting the Lion's Crest logo from the Kyburg Castle in Germany — the same crest that adorns Stroh's beer today.
1893: Stroh's Bohemian Beer wins a Blue Ribbon at the Columbian Exposition (The World's Fair) in Chicago.
1902: Bernhard Stroh Jr. takes control of the brewery upon his father's death. He changes the company's name to The Stroh Brewery Company.
1908: Bernhard Stroh's brother, Julius Stroh, takes over the brewery. After a tour of famous European breweries, he introduced the European fire-brewing method in the Stroh brewery.
1920: During Prohibition, the Stroh family operates under the name, The Stroh Products Company; producing near beer (beer with its alcohol extracted), birch beer, soft drinks, malt products, ice cream and ice. Though production of most of these items ceased when Prohibition ended in 1933, Stroh's Ice Cream can still be enjoyed today.
1964: The Stroh Brewery Company acquires Detroit-based Goebel Brewing Company, with an eye toward national distribution.
1978: The company produces and sells 6.4 million barrels of beer. Stroh's beer is available for purchase in 17 states.
1982: The Stroh Brewery Company purchases Schlitz Brewing Company, making Stroh the third-largest brewer in America.
1984: The company introduces the "first dog of beer," Alex the Dog, in a series of commercials and print advertisements.
1985: Landlocked and unable to expand operations to meet growing demand, the Stroh Brewery Company makes a difficult decision to close the original, 135-year-old brewery in Detroit.
1999: The Stroh Brewery Company sells most of its brands to Pabst Brewing Company, the largest American-owned brewing company.
Source: www.strohbeer.com and staff research
Spirits of Detroit columnist Robert Allen covers craft alcohol for the Free Press. Contact himr: rallen@freepress.com or on Untappd, raDetroit; Twitter @rallenMI, Facebook robertallen.news, and Periscope rallenMI