New York

Buffalo's appreciation for a frosty pint stretches back more than a century before anyone enjoyed a cold one with a basket of wings. By the middle of the 1800s, the industrial hub counted malt and beer among its most vital and satisfying products. Operations like Simon Pure Beer, Iroquois Beverage and the Magnus Beck Brewing Company brought Buffalo's world-class ales to the rest of the country. Prohibition saw a thriving business in black market hooch, though it all but killed the city's historic breweries. A few survivors struggled to recover. Today, a new batch of breweries like Community Beer Works and Big Ditch Brewing Company are crafting a beer revolution in the Queen City. Historian Michael Rizzo and brewer Ethan Cox explore the sudsy story of Buffalo beer.

Riding the wave of industries brought by the Erie Canal, Utica experienced a tremendous boom in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries--and it was all fueled by beer. Thirsty laborers lubricated their days with after-work ales and lagers made by crafters like the Oneida Brewing Company and Gulf Brewing Company. Brewing was a Utica industry in its own right, boasting more than forty breweries operating since 1801. Prohibition nearly sounded the death knell for the trade, but the Matt family's West End Brewing Company endured, becoming the first in the country to commence brewing in 1933. Thanks to their Saranac beer, the craft beer movement is old news for residents of the Handshake City, who have been enjoying these local favorites for more than 125 years. Join beer scholar Daniel Shumway as he explores the hoppy history of Utica beer.

With so many small towns loyal to local farms, food and drink, it's no surprise that Central New York's thriving brewing community stretches back to the early 1800s. After Rome lost two breweries to fire in 1858, at least a dozen more opened in the city over the next century. A group of Oneonta gentlemen decided the town needed a brewery in 1909, and in 2012, similar thinking launched Roots Brewing Company. Cooperstown is a beer destination, thanks to Brewery Ommegang and Council Rock, and breweries in nearby Canastota, Cazenovia, Garrettsville, Hamilton and Milford are now also drawing the thirsty masses. Local historian of hops Dan Shumway explores the long and sudsy story of beer in Central New York.

The Upper Hudson Valley has a long and full-bodied brewing tradition. Arriving in the 1600s, the Dutch established the area as a brewing center, a trend that continued well into the eighteenth century despite two devastating wars. The Erie Canal helped develop Albany into a beer capital of North America--Albany Ale" was exported across America and around the world. Upper Hudson Valley breweries continued to thrive until Prohibition, and some, like Beverwyck and Stanton, survived the dark years to revive the area's brewing tradition. Since the 1980s, there has been a renaissance in Upper Hudson Valley craft brewing, including Newman's, C.H. Evans, Shmaltz and Chatham Brewing. Beer scholars Craig Gravina and Alan McLeod explore the sudsy story of Upper Hudson Valley beer."