Beer Ads in Oshkosh No. 1

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Drink a Gallon of Beer Every Day!

Today’s ad for beer in Oshkosh comes from the November 25, 1912 edition of the Oshkosh Daily Northwestern. It was placed by the Oshkosh Brewing Company (OBC) who, at the time, was making all sorts of laughable claims for the healthful effects of their beer. Their aim was to undercut the equally ridiculous fictions of Prohibitionists who insisted that beer drinking was decadent, depraved and ought to be banned. Assholes. As brewers across the nation would soon learn, confronting a zealot with rhetoric never works. By decade’s end, the villains had won the day and beer was made illegal. But in the lead up to that tragedy there was fun stuff like this:

People who drink plenty of beer are always strong and healthy.
Prof. Dr. P. Bauer, Berlin, Germany, to demonstrate the effect of beer on health, says: "Of the 75 employees of Haase's Brewery, each of whom drinks over a gallon of beer daily, 56 have stood the rigid physical examination for enrollment in army; of the remaining 19, eight are minors, three were found too small in stature and four were rejected for defects suffered by accident."
Pure, well aged beer, like OSHKOSH BEER is a tonic, an appetizer, and a food that is nourishing and strengthening.

Here’s to your health... Let’s celebrate the good guys: get out there and drink a gallon of beer tonight!