Celebration Ales and the Queen’s Golden Jubilee
From: InnSpire - Issue 37 – June 2002

It has long been a tradition for brewers to celebrate Royal events, such as a Coronation; Jubilee; Wedding or perhaps just a Royal visit to their brewery. The brewers response was to produce a special bottled brew, often of a very high strength. A number of these have been so successful that they became regular brews after the event. One such example was Jubilee Stout from Sheffield brewers Carter Milner & Bird, originally brewed for the Silver Jubilee of King George V in 1935. Popular ever since, it eventually became a national brew in the Bass Charrington empire. Considering the vast number of brewers in existence at that time, there was the relatively small number of only 15 special ales produced. For the Coronation of King George VI two years later, the number had risen to 37. By the time our present Queen was crowned celebration ales were really becoming popular with 136 examples being bottled. The Queen’s Silver Jubilee was also quite well represented with 57 special brews. Interestingly the only remaining brewer to produce commemorative ale for all those occasions is Greene King. Will they keep their tradition intact by producing another for the Queen’s Golden Jubilee, celebrated this June?
The importance of the events celebrated often meant that many of the bottled ales were saved for posterity rather than being drunk. This has resulted in a thriving collectors market, often demanding very high prices for the rarest examples.

As commemorative bottled ales increased in popularity, ever more varied events were celebrated, from a brewery anniversary to Christmas ales; sporting events; even St. Valentines Day. Many were annual events, others just ‘one-offs’, like the Victory ales produced to commemorate 50th Anniversary of the ending of World War II and bottling to celebrate the Millennium and recent solar eclipse. CAMRA had its own 21st Anniversary ale in 1992, brewed by Bateman’s. George Bateman produced his own Victory Ale to celebrate saving the brewery from extinction; this also became a regular brew.
More recently there has been a tendency to produce commemorative draught ales rather than bottled. This is probably due to the guest beer market initiated by the Ber Orders legislation in the early 1990’s, together with the fact that it is more convenient for small and micro brewers to brew a special draught ale when they don’t have their own bottling plant. It is expected that this change will result in far less bottled ales for the Golden Jubilee than would normally have been expected. At the time of writing only six bottled ales have been found, from Fullers; Cains; Potton; Sainsbury (Youngs); Co-op (Thwaites) and Gales. In true tradition the latter brew has an ABV of 12%. The only local beer to surface to date is from Sheffield’s Abbeydale Brewery.
In addition to the Golden Jubilee, brews will soon be available to commemorate England’s World Cup campaign. The month of June should produce a good range of beers to sample on draught and in bottle, enjoy them.

John Hirst