April 7 is National Beer Day for a historic reason and one worth celebrating. The United States, land of the free, home of the brave, was also dry for a spell. Not dry like the air in Arizona, but dry as in alcohol was banned, unlawful, illegal.
Prohibition was a mistake. It came to the US in the form of the Volstead Act and the 18th Amendment. The federal government should never have tried any of that. In 1933, after 13 years of Prohibition, Congress amended their error by passing the Cullen-Harrison Act and a full repeal of the 18th Amendment came later. The new law went in effect on April 7, 1933. It allowed for the sale and consumption of beer with a low-level of alcoholic. That day turned into a nationwide beer party and Beer Day commemorates that return to normalcy, if you will.
Alcohol has been around for a very long time, and beer was either the first or second alcoholic beverage ever (wine being the other). Beer has been refined, innovated, and perverted but the original concept of fermentation and the basic ingredients of water, grains, hops and yeast still remain. Drinking a beer is like stepping back in time and having the same beverage as, I’ll let you think of your bar mate.
From antiquity to the founding of our country, beer was there. Before he was the Father of our Country, George Washington won a seat in the Virginia House of Burgess thanks to bringing kegs of beer to the polls. Beer continued to be popular as our nation grew.
Today beer is still very popular. By revenue, beer is a top beverage. By volume, beer is out-done only by bottled water and other non-alcoholic drinks, which are consumed daily and throughout the day as well. Alcoholic drinks and non-alcoholic drinks, for the most part, are incomparable and yet beer still stands near the top of many metrics.
Americans like beer. We hardly need a day to single it out when it’s so popular, however the history of Beer Day is worth knowing. If we don’t examine and learn from the mistakes of the past, then we are doomed to repeat them. Cheers.