4A • September 8, 2017 | Cannon Beach Gazette | cannonbeachgazette.com
Views from the Rock
Brewing guru shares his
story at Hayday fest
H
ood River, move over.
Cannon Beach is vying
for the No. 1 brew town in
Oregon. With Public Coast,
Bill’s and Pelican open for business
and a spirited citizenry behind them,
Cannon Beach is a must on the Oregon
beer trail, along with Bend, Ashland
and Eugene for starters.
What Cannon Beach has going for it
is the fi n-du-monde quality that would
have intrigued Ernest Hemingway. Add
to that a foodie culture, peerless local
ingredients and proximity to Destina-
tion Portland.
Hayday, what organizers hope will
be an annual beer festival in Cannon
Beach, is the latest invocation of this
fast-growing scene and, as a summer
party, this was one of the best.
“I’m like a coyote in the sheep
pen,” author and Hayday attendee Peter
Lindsey nudged after teaching me how
to walk comfortably with a full glass
of beer hanging from a lanyard around
my neck.
Martin North Hospitality President
Ryan Snyder invited about 150 of his
closest friends to sample lagers and
IPAs in the cool comfort of a tented
midtown spot.
I met with Snyder before I’d
sampled my fi rst Pilsner. Snyder, who
opened Public Coast last year, de-
scribed himself as “a food, beverage
and hospitality person.”
Snyder worked with Holy Cow
Casino and Brewery in Las Vegas in
the early 1990s. Before that, he drank
Coors light. “Then you realize there is
something more to it,” Snyder said.
“I’ve been in business my whole
life,” Snyder told me. “To be in the
brewing business is more like a broth-
erhood then a business. People are very
open and very supportive. It’s been an
amazing experience.”
EVE MARX/FOR CANNON BEACH GAZETTE
JEFF TER HAR/FOR CANNON BEACH GAZETTE
Public Coast brew Will Leroux and Martin North Hospitality President Ryan
Snyder.
Craft-beer pioneer
I started my Hayday experience
sampling the Alameda Lobo Amarillo,
a tequila barrel-aged imperial IPA that
really did taste of tequila. My compan-
ion tasted “The Bees Knees” Honey
Strong Ale and Pono Brewing’s Black
Hole Sun.
I snacked on a brat, hot from the
grill, before sampling Block 15’s Sum-
mer Knight’s Kolsch.
Then Lindsey gave another tug on
Publisher
David F. Pero
Editor
R.J. Marx
Circulation
Manager
Jeremy Feldman
Production
Manager
John D. Bruijn
Back-to-school
lesson for the
parents
T
R.J. MARX/CANNON BEACH GAZETTE
What are you drinking?
Standing out
Snyder landed in Oregon in 1995
and found a welcoming atmosphere to
broaden his experience. Public Coast,
a brewpub and eatery on East Third
on the site of the former Lumberyard,
is his latest Cannon Beach location.
With the ingenuity of brewmaster Will
Leroux, Public Coast is producing an
inventive and palate-pleasing array of
beers, including Stephen’s Root Beer,
a product of Leroux and his assistant
Stephen Snyder.
Hayday celebrated its inaugural
event with 47 beer-pouring stations.
Four of them were brewed by Ler-
oux, including two “VIP” entries: “La
Barrel-Age Blonde,” a pinot noir bar-
rel-aged imperial blonde ale and “Can-
nontucky Campfi re,” a bourbon-barrel
weizenbock — a German-style wheat
beer.
“We are very small players, but we
are hoping to celebrate what is happen-
ing in our backyard in Oregon,” Ryan
Snyder said.
Familiar names on the chalkboard
included Oakshire, Ninkasi and
Breakside, and local standouts Bill’s
Brewhouse, Pelican, Fort George,
Buoy Brewing, North Jetty and Seaside
Brewing. “What you’re seeing now is
everybody is trying to continually rein-
vent the craft beer culture, fi nding new
ways to stand out,” Snyder said.
The regional craft brew scene origi-
nated in Portland in the 1980s, he said,
inspired by “a gentleman named Fred
Bowman.”
Bowman is the former owner and
co-founder of Portland Brewing Com-
pany, one of Oregon’s fi rst post-Prohi-
bition microbreweries.
Bowman was active in the late
1970s and early ’80s, along with Art
Larrance, Dick and Nancy Ponzi of
BridgePort, Kurt and Rob Widmer, and
Mike and Brian McMenamin in lobby-
ing to legalize brewpubs in Oregon.
Today he serves as a consultant
to Public Coast and a mentor to both
Snyder and Leroux.
Sam Marx, ready for school.
JEFF TER HAR/FOR CANNON BEACH GAZETTE
Singer Nate Bosford at Hayday.
Drummer is Nick Rosetta.
CANNON SHOTS
R.J. MARX
R.J. MARX/CANNON BEACH GAZETTE
Fred Bowman, a founder of Portland
Brewing.
‘TO BE IN THE BREWING BUSINESS IS
MORE LIKE A BROTHERHOOD THEN A BUSINESS.’
Ryan Snyder, Martin North Hospitality president
my sleeve. “You want to meet Fred
Bowman?” he asked.
Upon introduction, Bowman unfold-
ed his story, back to the time when he
and other brewpub pioneers entered the
world of zymurgy.
With childhood friends Jim Good-
win and a third former classmate,
Art Larrance, Bowman produced test
batches in the basement of his Beaver-
ton home.
Changes in state law brought the
founding of BridgePort Brewing in
November 1984 and Widmer in March
1985. Portland Brewing was the city’s
third craft brewer, entering the market
in January 1986.
Financial success seemed uncertain.
“We were wringing our hands won-
dering if there would be enough of a
market for the three of us,” he said.
“Those three breweries are 100 times
bigger than the size they were and
there’s hundreds more breweries. It was
pretty shortsighted of us.”
Oregon beers come of age
Today, by raw numbers, Portland
has more breweries than any city in the
world, overtaking Cologne, Germany,
15 years ago, Bowman said.
MacTarnahan’s Pale Ale, named af-
ter an original investor, debuted in 1982
and became the Portland Brewing’s
Classifi ed Sales
Jamie Ramsdell
Advertising Sales
Holly Larkins
Chris Olson
Staff writer
Brenna Visser
Contributing
writers
Rebecca Herren
Katherine Lacaze
Eve Marx
Nancy McCarthy
CANNON BEACH GAZETTE
The Cannon Beach Gazette is
published every other week by EO
Media Group.
1555 N. Roosevelt, Seaside,
Oregon 97138
503-738-5561 • Fax 503-738-
9285
fl agship brew.
Portland Brewing’s IPA was pro-
duced when few were familiar with the
style in America. India Pale Ale had its
origins in England before the advent of
pasteurization and antiseptic packaging,
Bowman said. After a long sea voyage
most beers ended up tasting like “pickle
juice.” The strength and hoppiness of
the pale ales kept the beer drinkable for
English civil servants overseas.
“We were trying to make a beer
that wouldn’t make somebody used to
drinking a light lager spit it out,” Bow-
man said. “We were trying to make
something fairly mainstream.”
His success at Portland Brew-
ing came with international awards
and accolades. Bowman served as a
consultant after Portland Brewing Co.
was sold to Pyramid Brewing in 2003,
before turning to a role as an industry
consultant. Portland Brewing became
known as MacTarnahan’s until revert-
ing to the Portland Brewing Co. name
in 2013.
“I’m amazed that we can almost
get any style of beer in the world made
locally in Oregon,” Bowman said.
“It used to be Belgium which had the
greatest variety of styles, and we have
pretty much all of those beers. I think
small beers in the U.S. now infl uence
what is going on in Europe.”
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he new school year is upon us, signaling change.
Say goodbye to sleeping in, or lazy breakfasts
in your pj’s. Five mornings a week, there are
backpacks to fi ll and lunches to make, emergency
information and sports forms to fi ll out, and that tricky
business of actually getting the kids to school, whether
they take the bus, ride their bike, you drive, or they walk.
The start of the school year always puts me in mind
of when my son
was starting fourth
grade. He’d had
VIEW FROM
kind of a crappy
summer, not really THE PORCH
enjoying his time
EVE MARX
at town camp.
None of his best
buds were around
to play with. I tried to be entertaining. We went to the
town pool. We went to the movies. I’m embarrassed to
think how many times we hit McDonald’s.
By the time September rolled around, I knew my son
was ready to for school to begin. He’d always liked school
well enough, and he’d done the assigned summer reading.
Because he had so much time on his hands, he also read
the newest Harry Potter. So I was surprised when we hit
the third week of school and trouble fl ared up.
Almost from the moment he opened his eyes, my kid
was surly. The problem wasn’t that he didn’t like his
teacher; he’d lucked out and got a great male teacher
who also played drums in a local band. My son, had been
taking drum lessons since he was in fi rst grade, and had
his own good set and cymbals. The fi rst day of school he
told me how well he got along with Mr. Carpenter. “When
we’re not doing school stuff, we talk about drums and
music stuff.”
Every morning starting as soon as I woke him up, we
bickered about breakfast, the backpack, lunch, when he
should leave the house to walk up our long driveway to
meet the bus at the mailbox. Every morning was exhaust-
ing.
Mr. Carpenter called towards the middle of week 3.
“Your son is in a bad mood the fi rst half-hour of every
day,” he said. “It takes him that long to get into the school
day. Is something happening in your house that might be
causing this disturbance?”
I was alarmed by the call. It was the fi rst time a teacher
had talked to me about a problem with my child.
“Yes,” I said. “We argue every morning over the back-
pack and the lunch box.”
Mr. Carpenter took a few moments.
“Yes. We also argue over what he’s having for break-
fast. ”
“Hmm,” Mr. Carpenter said. “I suggest you let Sam
set his own alarm clock. Allow him to get his morning to-
gether by himself. Make sure he has supplies to make his
own breakfast and lunch. I suggest you don’t leave your
bedroom until right before he leaves. Say goodbye and
have a great day as he’s heading out the door, but nothing
else. Got it?”
I was shocked. My son was only 9 years old. Didn’t he
need me to supervise?
Long story short, that afternoon when he came home
from school, I told my son the new plan. We shopping and
bought whatever he thought he would need for the rest of
the week. The next morning I heard his alarm go off and
listened while he got himself ready. The only thing I did
I’m sure he found annoying was holler through my mostly
closed bedroom door, “Don’t forget to brush your teeth! ”
My son took good care of himself and we never had
another problem on school mornings again. And I learned
something I’d missed, which was I was raising a nicely
independent kid.
Good luck CB parents on the start of your school year.
It’s always an adventure.
THE NATIONAL AWARD-WINNING