As published in the American Brewers’ Review – November 20, 1896
It is characteristic of the fermentation industries of former times that certain excellent maxims which are valid today and will remain so for all time, were accompanied by other technical rules that were taken to be of equal propriety but as a matter of fact were little short of nonsensical. Brewers in those days lacked the scientific aids and trained observation enabling them to distinguish the accidental from the essential. Thus, it was held that the steep-tanks, tubs and brewing vessels could not be cleansed and scrubbed often enough, whereas the rules were by no means strict as to the purity of water for brewing purposes.
An interesting glimpse of affairs in the brewing trade at Berlin 150 years ago, is afforded by a book by Councilor Neumann, from which the following description is taken:
“Experience often shows that for the purpose of producing good beer and brewing most successfully, the purest and best water is not always desirable but that rather the most objectionable, slimy, and filthy water often yields beer of the best taste and greatest nourishment. There are some brewers of my personal acquaintance who have the finest water close by their brewhouses but do not use the same, considering it unfit for brewing. They prefer at much labor and expense to fetch the water from a distance, either from the river or from lakes, ditches or pools, which water is much nastier and sometimes manifestly filthy. On the “Werder” at Berlin on the Spreegracht near the bridge towards the Leipsic Gate, there are two pipes near which are the outlets of the public sewers and two big public washing places. All of these surely give no cause to expect that pure water could be obtained near such places, the more so since many street and private drains flow into the river while all manner of impurities are thrown in, the leather workers, tanners, and dyers drain their discharges into it, to say nothing of what the fairies of the night and bucket carriers may throw in every night as sacrifices to the deity of the river. Never-the-less these pumps which are stationed near such an eminently cleanly place where all dirt, urine, soap, and other filth is drained, are used very industriously by the brewers who come even as far as from the Friedrichs-Strasse to fetch water. It must be that experience teaches them that such water yields better beer than a pure one.” – Wochenschrift f. Brauerei No.39
Crescent City Brew Talk 