Point of Brew: Ruhstaller Beer returns to region

Your columnist and owner of the reinvented Ruhstaller band of beer enjoy a glass of the deep red “1881” ale. Jan-Erik D. Paino is a booster and proud resident of Sacramento; he admires Sacramento as a city where one can become someone, not a city where one must already be someone. Courtesy photo

Sacramento used to be the Milwaukee of the West. From the days of the Gold Rush to Prohibition, as many as a dozen breweries operated simultaneously in the city.

Sacramento was famous for turning the grain and hops that grow so well in the fertile valley soils into beer and for exchanging miners’ gold dust for brewers’ golden beers.

Ruhstaller was among the dominant beer brands in this region toward the end of the 19th century, and Ruhstaller relics from that era are highly collectable and correspondingly expensive.

For example, a common beer tray from that time is on offer for $1,200. The tray shows a picture of the brewery and associates the Ruhstaller name with Lager and Gilt Edge Steam Beer.

Now, nearly 150 years after the name first appeared on beer labels, Ruhstaller is again associated with beer in Sacramento.

Last week, I attended a delightful party at the charming Citizen Hotel on J Street in Sacramento to celebrate, among other things, the launch of two new beers to be sold under the historic Ruhstaller name. Present at the event were fifth-generation descendants of the original Ruhstaller family, although they are not investors in this new venture.

There were other interesting connections to the Ruhstaller dynasty. Turns out the Citizen Hotel itself is in a building that once belonged to the company, and, of course, the spectacular Ruhstaller building at 900 J St. is on the list of Sacramento’s historic buildings.

The new brewing venture has just released two beers. They are currently available on tap at Mulvaney’s and at Magpie and other up-market locations in Sacramento; incidentally, the tap handles are made from old tractor parts.

One beer, yet to be named, is a “fresh hop” product that can only be in short supply because its manufacture must be linked to the time of the hop harvest (just concluded). The other beer that will be more widely and consistently available is a rich red ale called 1881.

Capt. Frank Ruhstaller bought the City Brewery in Sacramento in 1881 and began making the first Ruhstaller beers. The City Brewery was established some 25 years earlier (1859) by William Borchers and others, but it must have been a crummy little place making but 15 barrels per day and operating on horse power.

Contemporary accounts explain that Capt. Ruhstaller made so many improvements and expansions as to comprise, over time, an entirely new brewery. He must have installed steam engines to do the heaviest work because the advertising of the Ruhstaller Brewery at the time listed Steam Beer.

He made a grand business of it and became an influential, respected and presumable wealthy member of the Sacramento business community.

Capt. Frank’s story is an inspiration to the new owner of the Ruhstaller brand, Jan-Erik D. Paino, a graduate of the School of Management at UC Davis and a Sacramento booster.

As is frequently the case with immigrants, Frank Ruhstaller had to move hard and fast to get where he was going. Frank came to the United States from Switzerland at the age of 15. At that tender age, by today’s standards at least, he already knew something of the brewing trade and joined the industry immediately upon arrival; many German speakers could do that because German was the argot of American brewing in that era.

He quickly rose from menial tasks to leadership roles, by the age of 18 (in 1865), he traveled to Sacramento by way of the Isthmus of Panama and went to work at City Brewery.

The Davis connection: Christmas Day 1870 must have been a happy one for Frank. That day, he married Charlotte Oeste, daughter of Jacob W. Oeste, who was one of the pioneers of our town. Jacob came to Davis from Milwaukee in 1868; although Milwaukee was already the brewing capital of America, Jacob was not in the brewing business there.

Jacob owned and farmed large acreage near Davis and was in the grain business. Did Frank Ruhstaller ever brew his father-in-law’s barley and possibly even hops?

Jacob died about the time Frank Ruhstaller bought the City Brewery and I wonder if Charlotte’s inheritance helped to finance that venture? That might not have been necessary, however, because Frank was already, since 1867, a member of the Sacramento Hussars, one of many independent militias formed in California before admission to the Union and later incorporated into the State National Guard.

The companies often were based on fraternal relationships and the Sacramento Hussars were all ethnic Germans. They were a cavalry unit and uniforms and horses were expensive so Frank was already prosperous. Frank became captain of the Hussars and presumably that was the origin of his title.

Of course, Prohibition eventually closed a great many breweries and Ruhstaller beer was gone by 1927. Now it’s back. I hope you will ask for it in Sacramento watering holes and try it when you see those distinctive tap handles crafted from tractor parts!

— Reach Michael Lewis at cymro@sbcglobal.net. Comment on this column at www.davisenterprise.com

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Posted by Michael Lewis on Sep 28 2011.
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