While the birthplace of American craft beer can be debated over a glass of locally-produced full flavored ale or lager, there can be no doubt as to where the epicenter of American craft brewing is located – Colorado.

In the late 1970s, Jimmy Carter was our President; the U.S. domestic brewing industry had come to be dominated by a dwindling number of breweries, all fairly large in scale and producing products very similar in character. These beers were typically very pale in color, light in body, highly carbonated and, to be frank, not very flavorful. Differentiation was hard to find, with the greatest product innovation of the prior half-century being the creation of light beer, a beverage that was even more lacking in description than its premium counterpart – less color, less body, less flavor.

Enter onto this landscape, Charlie Papazian. Charlie was one of a growing number of folks across the country that had become disenchanted with the beer that was commercially available at the time. So Charlie sought to do something about it.

He started brewing as a student at the University of Virginia while studying nuclear engineering and continued this journey of discovery in his kitchen in Boulder, Colorado. Doing so allowed Charlie to explore the vast array of beer styles that had for the most part disappeared from taverns and retailer’s shelves. As Charlie achieved a degree of proficiency with his own brewing, he set out to teach others the art and craft of making beer. Teaching homebrewing classes in Boulder, Charlie mentored several of the early industry pioneers.

While spreading the gospel of homebrewing, he was encouraged when in 1978 President Carter signed into law a bill legalizing the home manufacture of beer on the federal level.

Homebrewing became a lawful activity in many states. At the same time Charlie took steps in organizing the American Homebrewers Association (AHA), headquartered in Charlie’s Boulder residence, supposedly in close proximity to Charlie’s brewing equipment. The AHA put out periodic newsletters and gained in popularity to the point where Charlie felt compelled to write a book about homebrewing – The Complete Joy of Homebrewing - for those interested in this pursuit of hoppiness.



Charlie’s efforts with the AHA helped make information on small-scale brewing much more widely available. Small-scale brewing had been eroded to near nothing in the US from the end of Prohibition in the mid-1930s until the late 1970s. However, the availability of information coincided with a growing desire among a segment of beer drinkers for more full-bodied, full-flavored beers, which inspired a few groups of people to add a new chapter to the history of the American brewing industry.

Among the inspired was a group of fellows from Boulder, who used a goat farm in Boulder County near Hygiene, Colorado, to open the Boulder Beer Company in 1979, introducing Coloradans to commercially brewed craft beer. And a movement was born.


The business was difficult. Most of the brewing equipment available at that time was geared toward large-scale production. Much of the equipment for small-scale brewing had to be found used. Usually this equipment was old, maybe beat up, and certainly used in the production of other products such as milk, cheese or otherwise, meaning that most of the equipment the first craft brewers used had to be jerry-rigged in some fashion. As a result, achieving consistency and quality were persistent issues for the craft beer pioneers.

As with all of the early craft brewers, the owners of Boulder Beer had to exercise perseverance and patience, as the market grew first more accepting and then more excited for this new breed of brewer and the distinctive beers offered.

Through ups and downs and ownership changes, the Boulder Beer Company continues as one of the longest continually operated craft breweries in the country, celebrating its 30th anniversary this year.

The Wynkoop Brewing Company is widely recognized as the first brewpub to open for business in Colorado in 1988. Started by John Hickenlooper, the current mayor of Denver, and Russ Schehrer, one of Charlie’s award-winning homebrew pupils and the 1986 homebrewer of the year; the Wynkoop not only introduced Coloradans to the idea of fresh beer and fresh food produced and served at the same site, it also was a driving force in the revival of historic downtown Denver.

Fast forward to the present, and see how far we have come in Colorado. Today we have over 100 craft breweries in Colorado. This makes Colorado the number one state in the nation in terms of craft breweries per capita, number one in the nation in beer volume, number two in absolute number of craft breweries by state, and number two in the nation in sheer craft beer volume. This is extremely impressive for a state with a lower population than many others.

If you need further proof that Colorado is craft beer’s epicenter, look no further than the Brewers Association (BA), located in Boulder, and its premier event the Great American Beer Festival (GABF). The BA is what the original American Homebrewers Association has grown to become. The BA serves the interests of the nation’s craft brewers, offering the industry support in the form of promotion, public education and special events.

The Brewers Association held its first GABF in 1982, in Boulder. Twenty-two breweries attended, offering over 40 beers for sampling. At that time it was the biggest and only craft beer event around. While it is no longer the only craft beer event going, it is still the granddaddy of them all. The 2008 GABF boasted more than 400 breweries offering some 2000 beers to be sampled by the public in one place at one time.

This history lays the foundation for Colorado’s claim to the title the Epicenter of Craft Beer and why it has become the peak of the American craft beer industry.