This Is America’s Oldest Beer

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By Douglas A. McIntyre Published
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This Is America’s Oldest Beer

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Nearly as many people in America drink beer as those who drink water (something of an exaggeration). The National Beer Wholesalers Association claims that, in 2020, adults in the U.S. consumed over 26.1 gallons of beer and cider. The beer industry shipped 205 million barrels.

Beer is old. Beer-like beverages have probably been around for 13,000 years. There is evidence that the earliest beer was brewed around 7,000 BC. By 3,000 BC, beer was present in Europe. Over the centuries, Germany became the home of master brewers. Beer almost certainly came to the U.S. from Europe.

24/7 Tempo reviewed information from media sources and breweries themselves to determine America’s oldest beers. The first recorded beer brewed on American soil dates all the way back to 1587, and the first brewery popped up in 1632. However, the oldest continuously operating brewery in America only dates back to the 1800s. That brewery is still making the same beers that it did nearly 200 years ago.

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The oldest beers in America originated in only a handful of states, with Wisconsin, Pennsylvania, Minnesota, and Missouri home to several of them. In some states, whether it is because of climate and culture, beer consumption is far higher than others

America’s oldest beer is Yuengling Lord Chesterfield Ale & Porter. Here are the details:

> Year introduced: 1829
> State of origin: Pennsylvania
> Parent company: Yuengling Brewing

America’s oldest brewery, Yuengling, was founded by David G. Yuengling in Pottsville, Pennsylvania, in 1829 — two decades before the next oldest widely-available beer that is still sold today. Originally called Eagle Brewery, the name was changed to D.G. Yuengling & Son in 1873. During Prohibition, Yuengling sold dairy products and near-beer to remain profitable.

Click here to read America’s 30 Oldest Beers

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Photo of Douglas A. McIntyre
About the Author Douglas A. McIntyre →

Douglas A. McIntyre is the co-founder, chief executive officer and editor in chief of 24/7 Wall St. and 24/7 Tempo. He has held these jobs since 2006.

McIntyre has written thousands of articles for 24/7 Wall St. He is an expert on corporate finance, the automotive industry, media companies and international finance. He has edited articles on national demographics, sports, personal income and travel.

His work has been quoted or mentioned in The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, Los Angeles Times, The Washington Post, NBC News, Time, The New Yorker, HuffPost USA Today, Business Insider, Yahoo, AOL, MarketWatch, The Atlantic, Bloomberg, New York Post, Chicago Tribune, Forbes, The Guardian and many other major publications. McIntyre has been a guest on CNBC, the BBC and television and radio stations across the country.

A magna cum laude graduate of Harvard College, McIntyre also was president of The Harvard Advocate. Founded in 1866, the Advocate is the oldest college publication in the United States.

TheStreet.com, Comps.com and Edgar Online are some of the public companies for which McIntyre served on the board of directors. He was a Vicinity Corporation board member when the company was sold to Microsoft in 2002. He served on the audit committees of some of these companies.

McIntyre has been the CEO of FutureSource, a provider of trading terminals and news to commodities and futures traders. He was president of Switchboard, the online phone directory company. He served as chairman and CEO of On2 Technologies, the video compression company that provided video compression software for Adobe’s Flash. Google bought On2 in 2009.

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