40 Years in Beer (Book II), Part 57: Beer writer Michael Jackson’s reaction to the Red Room at the Public House (1994)

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40 Years in Beer (Book II), Part 57: Beer writer Michael Jackson’s reaction to the Red Room at the Public House (1994)
Michael Jackson at Rich O’s Public House, 1994, with pre-digital photo bomb by BBC brewer David Pierce.

Previously: 40 Years in Beer (Book II), Part 56: Michael Jackson’s 1994 visit to Louisville — BBC, the Silo, Rich O’s.

“When one thirsts for a glass of wine or a pint of beer, the brain gradually registers the order as a half-heard whisper. The volume is slowly turned up, creating a gentle, purring, reverberation throughout the nervous system. It seems a pleasurable massage at first, then becoming tenacious. You are in the hands of a higher authority that brooks no argument. It is desire, and the streetcar cannot leave its lines. Your destination is a rendezvous with a drink.”
— Michael Jackson, circa 2006

Pioneering British beer writer Michael Jackson (1942-2007) spent a busy day in Louisville on November 19, 1994, making stops at Bluegrass Brewing Company, the Silo Microbrewery and Rich O’s Public House. Jackson was conducting a research tour of American microbreweries for a book he never published, although his findings later appeared as part of other writing projects.

While the Beer Hunter came and went in just a day’s time, for months afterward our burgeoning “better beer” community was euphoric about his visit. Back at work on Monday morning, I felt a tremendous sense of vindication, and my morale was through the roof.

It’s important to remember that in 1994 it was ludicrous — verily, banana cream pie imperial stout in the sky — to imagine there’d ever be 20-30 operational breweries in the Louisville metropolitan area, as actually do exist here three decades later.

However, we were quite sure there was room for more than only two. Jackson’s decision to include Louisville on his itinerary seemed like a harbinger of great things to come and they  have. Had you informed me 27 years ago that one day there’d be five breweries in New Albany alone, I’d have judged you crazier than people always assumed I was, given my delusional certainty as early as 1982 that New Albanians would in fact drink Märzen, India Pale Ale and beers soured on purpose.

For the three co-owners of the embryonic Rich O’s Public House, later to become the New Albanian Brewing Company, the obvious highlight of Jackson’s late autumn day in Louisville came when he walked through the doors of our establishment, drank an Imperial pint of Sierra Nevada Porter, and...Read more