A few retail stores began dedicating more shelf space to craft beer, and a handful carried only beer, something that would have been unthinkable when only eighty breweries existed in the whole United States, and most of those made beer that tasted the same. New bars and pubs opened that were dedicated to good beer in ways that no one had ever seen before. Over the last three or so decades, a lot of good people opened breweries. It took the blink of an eye in geological time, but moved at a more glacial pace for those of us who longed to have great-tasting beer more readily available. Even for those of us who witnessed the near death of beer in the United States, only to see it rise from the ashes, it’s getting harder and harder to remember a time when, upon entering the average bar, we had no guarantee that something worth drinking would be on tap. Whole new generations are coming of age in a world where they’ve never known a time when good beer was not available. In the nearly fifty years since Fritz Maytag bought the failing Anchor Brewery to keep his favorite beer from disappearing, and in the thirty-five years since Jack McAuliffe built the first modern microbrewery from scratch out of discarded dairy tanks and other scraps, a lot has happened to the world of beer. Between Anchor Brewing, the New Albion Brewery, and a few of the earliest brewpubs in the nation, the California Bay Area got a jump on the rest of the country in its passion for better beer. Northern California is the birthplace of the modern craft beer industry. And a lot of them, including many of the best, are made in California. There have never been more choices of different beers, more original beers, and more places to buy them. Never before have American craft brewers brought to the market the quality and diversity of products that they are offering today. It may, in fact, be the best time in history to enjoy and appreciate beer.

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