How one picture shows how far Beer Events have come within my own beer corner in eleven years.
Whilst
recently clearing out some stuff my mother happened upon the above newspaper
cutting from Thursday 8th September 2005. As with all such memorabilia it shows
a frozen moment in time and one that instantly spawned the words of this
post.
What we are looking at is an image from the 14th annual
Saddleworth Beer Festival as reported on by the Oldham Advertiser. To shed
further light on the information already given the top row (left to right)
consists of my father, my brother and long-time friend Wes. The bottom row
(left to right) holds my adoptive-Uncle Simon, real Uncle David and Aunt Marie.
Here are my family in the local paper enjoying a beer festival eleven years ago.
A further caveat is that this was one of three consecutive years
that my family group, with a few additions on top of this in other years, made
the main picture to coincide with this occasion’s article. With a mixture of
ages and a biggish group we must have seemed the ideal target for photographic
evidence, with most of the other attendees being lonesome ale drinkers or at
most groups of two. Year after year my family group may have been the only
faces to prove that beer bridged all ages and genders at this festival.
You see, the Saddleworth Beer Festival was a rather small do held
in a room in the local museum and often featured no more than 14 beers. The
article to accompany the photograph proudly boasts that it features seven local
breweries - and at the time that was a huge feat.
I wasn't living in the area the three times my family made the
papers and only attended the festival once in around 2008 (failing to make the
paper that year – my quiff wasn’t as magnificent perhaps.) What is perhaps most
telling in the unwritten story of this photograph though - to us at least - is
the omission of our friend Luke.
Luke should be stood on the top row to the right of Wes. He
enjoyed this festival as much as the rest and was part of the group to make the
paper. However he excluded himself from the photograph by choice when the
Oldham Advertiser cameraman asked. Why?
Because Luke didn't want to be associated with the types who
attend Real Ale festivals.
Yes Luke was worried about his "street-cred" by
appearing in this photograph.
This is the same Luke who has been to most Indy Man Beer Cons with
me and was disappointed to miss out on a ticket this year. He has certainly
been pictured at that festival many times without embarrassment.
And if you want to add further fuel to that little fire - the bottom row in this picture would not even consider going to an event like Indy Man if you bought the ticket for them. Yet they travelled 20 miles for this tiny Saddleworth festival in 2005.
So here we have a little snapshot of local beer festival history.
A time when beer festivals could be tiny, the pool of beer to appear on the bar
small and the idea of being young and seen at one terrifying. Eleven years on
and, whilst we all know the times have certainly changed, it’s certainly worth
remembering that even my generation of drinkers can remember simpler times. We didn’t know what a
hipster was then. We just came for the fact that an event about beer existed.
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