Inside uncovered 19th-century beer cave where no one has been for 100 years

29 February 2024 , 10:51

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Inside uncovered 19th-century beer cave where no one has been for 100 years

A team from an investment firm tasked with renovating an old brewery were delighted to find a cave hidden for 100 years which was an essential part of brewing in the 19th century. The plan was to turn the building into residential units, but the new owners had also been tipped off that there might be something more to the site.

Iowa Main Street Investments, led by Brian Bock, acquired the old brewery in the small town of Cascade two years ago, and was given some historical information that there may be an old 'beer cave' sitting underneath the building. Eastern Iowa has no shortage of hometown breweries, many of which would have grown out of these early breweries.

The cave was uncovered during renovations to the building

Brock told KCRG: "We were given some historical information that potentially there was a beer cave underneath this building somewhere. Nothing ever brought us any indication that there was actually a beer cave here." but as work progressed the excavation by construction crews revealed two arches, leading to the unearthing of the well-preserved beer cave.

Mark Weber of Weber Construction said: "All of a sudden, we saw these two arches right here. So they investigated by digging down even more. It was crazy." The crews finally got to the point in their work where the full extent of the cave was revealed.

And Brock said he was shocked at how well preserved the beer cave was after such a long time being hidden away. He added: "No one has set foot in it for 100 years, and for it to be preserved as well as it has been. It’s a pretty unique find, and obviously one that I never would have dreamt of."

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Iowa City boasts an intricate network of 19th-century subterranean passages, historically employed for beer fermentation and transportation. Beer enthusiast and owner of John's Grocery, Doug Alberhasky, who conducts guided tours of beer caves in the city, explained how significant these subterranean spaces were in maintaining the ideal beer temperature during brewing.

He said: "The beer needed to be served cold and stored cold for the entire month that it was being brewed. So, they had to have caves underground that they could put ice in to keep the beer at a happy 33 and a half degrees or so." He added that because beer needed to be kept at a specific temperature, back then, beer was hyper-local.

Alberhasky was also full of praise for the people who built and maintained the caves in remarkable engineering feats, where people relied solely on horsepower and human labour. He added: "When they built them, there was no hydraulics, there were no pneumatics. It was all done with horsepower and human power. And the fact that they were able to do all of this, to this extent is pretty amazing."

And according to Gin Raiders, in another recent discovery of well-preserved antiquities, a nearly pristine, unopened bottle of Gordon’s Gin from more than 70 years ago was found in the walls during the clearing out of a historic hotel's cellar which was estimated to be worth £470.

Paul Donald