Mid-Atlantic Brewing News August/September 2012
Book Reviews: Baltimore Beer: A Satisfying History of Charm City Brewing by Rob Kasper
Reviewed by Martin Morse Wooster
The History Press continues its excellent series of local beer histories with this volume, dcvoted to the history of Baltimore brewing. Like Rich Wagner's Philadelphia Beer, Kasper's Baltimore Beer is a good book, well worth owning, that fills a significant gap in beer history. But comparing the two books shows two different approaches to the same subject.
While Wagner comes out of the breweriana movement, Kasper was a long-time writer for the Baltimore Sun. Wagner probably had too much information for the space alotted; Kasper, writing about a city a third the size of Philadelphia, needs to stretch his material. Wagner delivers the meat and potatoes; Kasaper treats his subject as a feature writer would, with as much local color as he can dig up.
Both Wagner and Kasper have valid ways of looking at beer history. As someone who prefers stories to production statistics, I might prefer Kasper's approach...
For complete review see this issue of MABN and go to page 5.