Baltimore Breweriana

While visiting my parents near Baltimore on Thanksgiving, my Dad mentioned he had a growler somewhere from the old Sisson's brewpub in Baltimore. I was intrigued by this so he looked in the storage room and brought out the two growlers in the photograph. In addition to the Sisson's growler he also had a DeGroen's Märzen growler. Other than being a bit dirty, they are both in good shape.

DeGroen's, AKA the Baltimore Brewing Company, was located on Albemarle Street in Baltimore. The brewery closed in February 2005 after brewing on the location for 15 years. A hotel is slated to be built on the site. DeGroen's German-style beers where apparently very popular but they cut back production in 2004 and closed the following year.

Sisson's Pub on Cross Street was opened in 1979 by Al Sisson and the onsite brewery was added in 1989. Sisson's was the first brewpub in Maryland since Prohibition. Al's son, Hugh Sisson managed the brewpub until 1994 when he left to start Clipper City Brewing. Sisson's closed in 2002. Thomas Cizauskas has some history of Sisson's posted here.

It was a fun surprise to see these two pieces of Maryland brewing history. For further reading, there's an interesting summary of the brewing history in Maryland here.