UNIVERSITY BEER

Ashburton Guardian, Volume 48, Issue 79, 13 January 1928, Page 6

UNIVERSITY BEER

BREWED FOR QUEEN'S COLLEGE. One of the relics of the past, when ail large establishments in England and , many small ones, too, brewed their own beer, is brought to notice by the retirement of Mr Fred Hunt, who has brewed beer for Queen’s College, Oxford, for the* last 30 years, and has been in, the service of the college for over half a century. The retirement of Mr Hunt does not mean the cessation of the brewing, which will go on as it has done for centuries (says “Landmark,-” the organ of the Eng-lish-speaking' Union). “I haw been in servioe here 56 years,” he said, “and although I am going now,, I will still come in and; see if the brew keeps up to the good old standard of. Queen’s. Queen’s; is the last of the undergraduate colleges in Oxford to brew its own beer. I started my last brew yesterday. It has* ten day’s fermentation. t have three- vats going, and the beer will fill nine Barrels of 36 gallons each. The work o£ brewing is all done by hand". There is no machinery. The extract of malt is pumped into the copper by a pump which dates back to about 1600. That will be don© by my successor. I have passed on to him the teaching I received ,and with it the good old traditions of the college brew. When I had been here-S© years the college presented me with a ‘fellows* plate’ ; the same as the fellows get when they call for a Opiate of beer/ My health was toasted in the famous chancellor brew. Thatris more than double the ordinary strength, and is drunk on special occasions/’