Bitter Brew: The Rise and Fall of Anheuser-Busch and America's Kings of Beer (47 page)

Some of the magic of the Busch beer dynasty can still be seen just across the street from Long's restaurant. On a recent spring afternoon before the opening of the tour season, the sun-dappled 281 acres of Grant's Farm offered a glimpse of what life must have been like during the seventy-plus years that August A. and Gussie were the lords of the manor. Up at the big house, in the second-floor bedroom where both of them died, Adolphus's barber chair still gleamed in the center of the marble bathroom, and Gussie's bright-red Cardinals-Budweiser sport coats hung neatly in the closet, right above his collection of idiosyncratic cowboy boots. A lone visitor's footsteps echoed across the empty courtyard of the Bauernhof, a structure that boggles the modern American mind—a fortress barn with room enough to seat 1,000 dinner guests.

The estate is still owned jointly by the six surviving children who grew up there—Adolphus IV, Beatrice, Peter, Trudy, Billy, and Andrew. Now that the brewery has been sold, it's the one thing that binds them together, however uneasily. The company operates the public portion of the farm under the terms of a lease that doesn't cover the expenses, according to the family, and there is disagreement among the six about what to do when the lease comes up for renewal in 2013. In the meantime, the public tours of the Bauernhof, deer park, and animal compounds go on, while a small staff of longtime Busch family employees maintains the mansion and cottage as if Gussie and Trudy still lived there.

The big house was the scene of a family reunion of sorts in July 2010, when Billy Busch hosted a tasting of the first offerings from the William K. Busch Brewing Company, which he launched with the millions he made when InBev paid him seventy dollars a share for the stock his father left him. His mother, Trudy, was there—her first visit to the house since 1978—along with his oldest brother, Adolphus IV, and members of the von Gontard and Anheuser clans.

St. Louis's newest beer company was officially introduced to the city on the evening of November 6, 2011, during a combined press conference and coming-out party at the World's Fair Pavilion in Forest Park, the site of the city's grandest achievement 107 years before. Dressed in a sport coat and slacks, Billy addressed the public for the first time in his life, telling the crowd of about 500 beer distributors, retailers, local reporters, and civic leaders that, unlike any other American lagers, his two brands, Kräftig (German for “strong”) and Kräftig Light, are brewed in adherence to the ancient German Purity Law, or
Reinheitsgebot
. Enacted in Bavaria in 1516, the law decreed that beer be brewed using only four natural ingredients: barley malt, hops, yeast, and water.

Billy also pledged that his company would operate in the civic-minded tradition handed down by his forebears.

“My family was in the beer business for 150 years and was an employer in this city and a supporter of the community for all that time, and now we are not involved, and that didn't seem right,” Billy said.

“I am very fortunate to have been the recipient of a lot of wealth because of my family's success in the beer business, and I am willing to put my money at risk to build a company that will create jobs in St. Louis and allow the profits to stay in this city and this country as opposed to a foreign country.”

Kräftig and Kräftig Light went on sale in the St. Louis region in October 2011 and quickly captured a measurable share of the market, even managing to gain entry to Busch Stadium, where only a handful of non–AB InBev brands are sold. In July 2012, Adolphus IV bought a 49 percent interest in the Salmon River Brewery, a craft beer maker in Idaho.

On a recent Saturday afternoon, fifty-one-year-old Billy was seen going about the business of making friends during a product tasting at a large, upscale grocery store in West St. Louis County, where he spent an afternoon working the aisles with the energy and enthusiasm reminiscent of his father in his prime. Introducing himself to a woman whose eyes lit up in recognition at the sound of his name, he asked what brand of beer she drank.

“Oh, I really don't drink beer,” she replied, apologetically.

“How about your husband? What does he drink?”

Flustered by the unexpected close encounter with a Busch, she couldn't remember her husband's brand. “Why don't we call and ask him?” Billy suggested. And so they did, with Billy doing the talking.

“Hi, this is Billy Busch and I'm here at the grocery store with your wife and she's trying to remember what brand of beer you drink.”

“Budweiser Select,” the man said. Billy smiled.

A few minutes later, the woman left the store with a good story to tell and a six-pack of a brand-new beer brewed by a member of the Busch family.

Apparently, Gussie's American dream hasn't died.

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This book is based largely on several hundred hours of interviews with members of the Busch family, their friends and employees, former executives of Anheuser-Busch, brewing industry experts, and former local and federal law enforcement officers. The bulk of the historical background is drawn from the archives of the
St. Louis Post-Dispatch
and the
St. Louis Globe-Democrat
, the longtime newspapers of record regarding Anheuser-Busch and the Busch family, and from the Henry Tobias Brewers and Maltsters Collection, located at the Western Historical Manuscripts Collection at the University of Missouri–St. Louis. The author also relied on court documents, the reporting of the
New York Times
, the
Los Angeles Times
, the
Wall Street Journal
, the
Chicago Tribune
,
Business Week
,
Fortune
,
Forbes
,
Newsweek
, the Associated Press, the
Riverfront Times
, and the books
Making Friends Is Our Business
, by Roland Krebs and Percy J. Orthwein;
Under the Influence
, by former
Post-Dispatch
reporters Peter Hernon and Terry Ganey;
October 1964
, by David Halberstam; and
Dethroning the King
, by former
Financial Times
reporter Julie MacIntosh.

1–8 Confidential interviews by author.

9 A crowd began gathering: “The Day the Beer Flowed Again,”
St. Louis Globe-Democrat
, April 2, 1983.

10 Inside the iron gates:
St. Louis Post-Dispatch Sunday Magazine
, April 3, 1983, 9.

10 On the bottling plant floor: Roland Krebs and Percy J. Orthwein,
Making Friends Is Our Business: 100 Years of Anheuser-Busch
(St. Louis: Anheuser-Busch, 1953).

11 Eager to reestablish: “Reinforcements from Abroad,”
St. Louis Post-Dispatch
, December 27, 1969.

12 And now, finally:
St. Louis Post-Dispatch Sunday Magazine
, April 3, 1983.

12 “April seventh is here”: Anheuser-Busch archival recording.

13 Back at Kyum Brothers Café: “The Day the Beer Flowed Again,”
St. Louis Globe-Democrat
, April 2, 1983

13 At 2:30 a.m:
St. Louis Post-Dispatch Sunday Magazine
, April 3, 1983.

13 By breakfast time: “King of Bottled Beer,”
Fortune
, July 1932, 44.

14 “Beer is Back!”: Krebs and Orthwein,
Making Friends Is Our Business
, 172–75.

15 “Teutonic tide”: “Irish and German Immigration,” Independence Hall Association, ushistory.org/us/25f.asp.

15 “A sudden and almost unexpected wave”: Mary Jane Quinn, “Local Union #6: Brewing, Malting and General Labor Department,” master's thesis, University of Missouri, 1947.

15 St. Louis even had: Ibid.

16 Adolphus worked for two years: “King of Bottled Beer,” 48.

16 On March 7, 1861: Peter Hernon and Terry Ganey,
Under the Influence: The Unauthorized Story of the Anheuser-Busch Dynasty
(New York: Simon & Schuster, 1991), 26.

16 It's unlikely that: Gerald Holland, “The King of Beer,”
American Mercury
, October 1929, 171.

16 Eberhard rewarded Adolphus: Hernon and Ganey,
Under the Influence
, 33, 34.

17 Of course, Adolphus got an assist: “Irish and German Immigration.”

18 Sure enough: Martin H. Stack, “A Concise History of America's Brewing Industry,” eh.net/encyclopedia/article/stack.brewing.history.us.

18 the Pasadena estate: Ibid., 46

18 Everything he did: Hernon and Ganey,
Under the Influence
, 120.

19 When he and Lilly celebrated: Ibid., 78

19
Custer's Last Fight
: Death Notices,
Indianapolis Star
, May 9, 1921.

21 “promoter of villainous dives”: Hernon and Ganey,
Under the Influence
, 69.

21 “Mr. President, the demand I speak of”: Richard Bartholdt,
From Steerage to Congress: Reminiscences and Reflections
(Philadelphia: Dorrance, 1930): 206–7.

22 On June 10, 1910: “75 Years Ago,”
St. Louis Globe-Democrat
, June 10, 1985.

22 Adolphus did not live to see: Hernon and Ganey,
Under the Influence
, 84–87.

23 With an original par value: “King of Bottled Beer,” 48.

24 The Busch family's ties: Ibid.

24 Despite these efforts: Ibid., 98.

24 Upon her arrival in Key West: Hernon and Ganey,
Under the Influence
, 100.

25 “an attempt to substitute”: Krebs and Orthwein,
Making Friends Is Our Business
, 160.

26 “The temperate use”:
The Anheuser-Busch Brewery
, brochure, Henry Tobias Brewers and Maltsters Collection, Western Historical Manuscripts Collection, University of Missouri–St. Louis.

26 “generally innocent”: Department of Information, brochure, U.S. Brewers Foundation, Tobias Collection.

26 “You can afford to ride this out”: “Gussie Busch: Beer Dynasty Dynamo,”
St. Louis Post-Dispatch
, April 19, 1970.

27 “Our whole welfare and happiness”: Hernon and Ganey,
Under the Influence
, 64.

27 The estate featured a $250,000:
Grant's Farm: Preliminary Boundary Adjustment Evaluation, Reconnaissance Study
, National Parks Service, U.S Department of the Interior.

27 steeped in American history: Ibid., 6–8.

29 “We ended up as the biggest”: Hernon and Ganey,
Under the Influence
, 132.

29 Anheuser-Busch lost: “King of Bottled Beer,” 102.

29 He saw Tessie one last time: Hernon and Ganey,
Under the Influence
,158.

30 In June 1922: Krebs and Orthwein,
Making Friends Is Our Business
, 131–34.

30 To President Coolidge: Ibid., 135.

31 His most effective broadside: Hernon and Ganey,
Under the Influence
, 149.

31 In one way: Ibid., 163.

32 At age sixty-eight: Ibid., 161.

33 “with the utmost simplicity”: Ibid., 165.

33 August A.'s estate: Ibid., 166.

35 Marie was twenty-two: “300 Guests See Miss Church and A.A. Busch Jr. Wed,”
St. Louis Globe-Democrat
, April 28, 1918.

35 Beautiful, refined, and polished: Hernon and Ganey,
Under the Influence
, 126.

36 One of his cousins: Hernon and Ganey,
Under the Influence
, 171.

37 “recently divorced”: “August A. Busch Jr. Weds Mrs. E. O. Dozier, Recently Divorced,” Associated Press, September 23, 1933.

37 The second marriage didn't yield: Lotsie Busch Webster, interview by author, 2011.

40 Viewed from an era: Krebs and Orthwein,
Making Friends Is Our Business
, 218–19.

41 “
very
good business”: “Busches: ‘Too Flamboyant for St. Louis High Society.'”
St. Louis Post-Dispatch
, August 26, 1975.

42 “Grandaddy would take us hunting: “
St. Louis Post-Dispatch
, August 25, 1973.

46 hundreds of thousands of olive-drab cans: Krebs and Orthwein,
Making Friends Is Our Business
, 225–26.

47 Per capita consumption: Stack, “Concise History.”

47 But all was not well: Webster, interview.

48 Gussie's homecoming: “Col. Busch Won't Run for Mayor,”
St. Louis Globe-Democrat
, February 9, 1945.

49 The problem: Hernon and Ganey,
Under the Influence
, 51.

50 Gussie bounded onto the Anheuser-Busch throne:
St. Louis Post-Dispatch
, August 27, 1975.

50 “a Wagnerian air to the whole enterprise”: “The Very Last of the Marvelous Beer Barons,”
St. Louisan
magazine, January 1976, 40–47.