Tucked away among fearsome-looking predators on the Field Museum’s first floor, there’s a small room housing the temporary Brewseum exhibit, which provides information about the history of Chicago breweries that they never taught us in school, and apparently still don’t, as evidenced by the lack of screaming children on field trips in my midst.
Having previously enjoyed hearing the Brewseum’s executive director, Liz Garibay, speak at the Art Institute, I was hoping for a larger, not just lager, exhibit. But at least they give you the opportunity to design your own beer label, and present you with some particulars for use in your next bar discussion after you run out of things to say about sports and politics.
William Lill and Michael Diversey owned the first Chicago brewery, which was destroyed in the Chicago Fire. What makes this interesting is knowing that the city eventually named a major street after Diversey, but only a minor one after Lill. The unstated reason, I presume, is that Diversey also was a Chicago alderman.
The Siebel Institute of Technology, located on Goose Island, founded in 1868 as the Siebel Zymotechnic Institute, and renamed in 1872, is a vocational school that focuses on brewing science. Perhaps my next career move.
As if they were children playing tee ball, the Pabst and Schlitz brewing companies both received participation medals at the 1893 Chicago World’s Fair. But Pabst later added Blue Ribbon to its name, even though there was no blue ribbon awarded at the fair.
On my way out, I made a quick stop at the museum’s Science Hub, where I was told that the Philippines contains two-thirds of the earth’s biodiversity and where I was given the opportunity to pet a dead chipmunk, which might have seemed more appealing had the Brewseum offered free samples.