THIRSTYGROWLER
EcHoEs oF cAnNeRiEs pAsT
Local breweries, once fi sh canneries, are canning once again
BY WILLIAM DEAN
Brews & News
Listen closely and you can almost hear
the clamor of the canning lines from a cen-
tury ago.
Along Astoria’s waterfront, where hun-
dreds of workers once toiled in salmon and
tuna canneries, there has been a revival of
sorts. Canning has returned, this time under
the roofs of craft breweries.
“It’s certainly an interesting turn of
events to see that transition,” local histo-
rian John Goodenberger said. “It speaks to
the beauty of an industrial building in that
it’s adaptable. They’ve been repurposed for
a new cause, a new product. Now they’re
canning beer,” Goodenberger added.
Nearly all of the city’s brewhouses are
canning now, in part due to shifting eco-
nomics . Canning is cheaper than bottling,
and while draught beer brings the highest
profi t, the lingering pandemic has damp-
ened sales in taprooms and pubs.
In the past year alone, several of Asto-
ria’s breweries have invested in sophisti-
cated and speedy canning machines, includ-
ing Fort George Brewery, Buoy Beer Co.,
Astoria Brewing and Reach Break Brew-
ing. When Obelisk Beer Co. launches this
spring, the brewery’s owners plan to start
canning immediately. All of the breweries
believe canning is here to stay.
What’s striking about the trend are the
echoes from Astoria’s once robust fi sh can-
ning era. Buoy Beer opened on the water-
front nearly a decade ago in a former fi sh
processing house and cannery. Now the
brewery is doing canning of its own.
Further down the banks of the Colum-
bia, toward the Astoria Bridge, workers at
Fort George’s processing facility are now
guiding cans along conveyor belts, des-
tined for bottle shops and markets through-
out the region. It’s happening in a space that
was once used to make cans and labels for
the tons of fi sh harvested from local waters.
“The building was literally made for can-
Brace yourself for Reach Break Brewing’s
special Oyster Stout, an Irish-style brew
made with Pacifi c northwest oysters, fi t-
tingly slated for release on St. Patrick’s Day.
The Oregon Otter Beer Festival, scheduled
for March 12 in Portland, quickly sold out.
It’s a fundraiser for the Elakha Alliance, a
nonprofi t dedicated to restoring sea otters
to the Oregon Coast. Thirteen breweries,
including Fort George, are participating.
You can’t go, but you can still donate!
Obelisk Beer Co. remains on track to open
its Astoria brewery this spring. A custom
brewing facility has been ordered and
remodeling is underway at the former
Columbia Fruit & Produce building on
Bond Street, including a concrete ramp
leading to a new entrance that will open
into a taproom.
ning. Now it’s continuing that tradition with
a diff erent ingredient,” head production
brewer Michal Frankowicz said.
But the high-tech operations run by
breweries today with just a handful of
employees bear little resemblance to the
gritty fi sh canneries of old, where workers
fl anked the lines for grueling shifts.
There were once dozens of salmon can-
neries in the Columbia-Pacifi c, but as
salmon stocks declined, the number of riv-
erside processing plants dwindled. By 1970,
there were only six. Ten years later, Bumble
Bee Seafoods, the city’s last major cannery,
closed on Pier 39.
Today, the heritage of canning is deeply
ingrained in Astoria, chronicled in muse-
ums and by old salts on bar stools. It’s even
refl ected in the label art decorating down-
town trash containers.
The dawn of beer-canning on the water-
front is a good thing, according to Gooden-
berger. Breweries could have demolished
Hanthorn Cannery Museum
Women can fi sh in Astoria.
Photos by William Dean
ABOVE: Chris Lamb, assistant packaging
manager, monitors the packing of Fort
George’s City of Dreams hazy IPA. RIGHT:
Canning beer the modern way at Fort
George’s waterfront facility. The system can
produce 100 cases in 10 minutes.
the historic industrial buildings and gone
modern. Instead, they’re giving the old
structures new life. “It’s nice to see a leg-
acy continued,” Goodenberger said, “We’ve
gone from tuna and salmon to beer.”
William Dean is an author with a pas-
sion for craft beer. His suspense novels,
“The Ghosts We Know” and “Dangerous
Freedom” are available at Amazon and in
bookstores. Column ideas? Contact him at
williamdeanbooks@gmail.com.
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