Blanche Rahr’s Beer Life

Blanche Rahr was not the first woman to take ownership of an Oshkosh brewery. But she was definitely the woman most identified with the beer business here. Blanche was part-owner and secretary-treasurer of Rahr Brewing from 1917 until 1956. She was the public face of Oshkosh’s longest-lived, family-owned brewery.

Blanche Rahr

The Rahr brewery at the foot of Rahr Avenue was established in 1865 by Charles Rahr, Blanche’s grandfather. Blanche was born in 1892 and was four when her father, Charles Rahr Jr., became head of the brewery. The business of making and selling beer was a constant presence throughout her life.

Rahr Brewing, late 1890s.

Blanche grew up doing the simple brewhouse chores that every child named Rahr had been performing since the brewery’s founding. It turned out she was good with numbers, and by the age of 14 worked her way into managing the brewery’s accounts. Blanche was 17 and still in school when her name went on the brewery’s ledger as its bookkeeper.

An undated photo of Blanche Rahr.

She was outspoken and determined. She had to be. Part of her job was to bring to account delinquent saloon keepers, men twice her age who were unaccustomed to receiving ultimatums from a woman. But Blanche often held the trump card. Her family owned many of the saloons that sold Rahr’s beer. The young lady could put you out of business if she cared to.

What is now Ratch and Deb's Pizza at the corner of Merritt and Bowen was once a saloon owned by the Rahr family.

Her influence increased in 1917 when her father retired from the brewery. He transferred ownership of the business to Blanche and her two younger siblings; her brother, Charles, and her 17-year-old sister Lucille. Charles, three years younger than Blanche and fresh off his service in World War I, became the brewmaster at Rahrs. Blanche, all of 24-years-old, managed the brewery’s day-to-day business affairs.

Blanche's brother and sister, Carl and Lucille.

Blanche's plucky reputation preceded her. She was a fitting choice for a role in a 1921 promotional film that called for a woman to take an unusual drive with an Oshkosh Motor Truck Company vehicle.

Miss Blanche Rahr of this city at the wheel, piloted the big machine up the steps of the Oshkosh High School in a fashion that won the approval of the spectators who had gathered to witness the stunt. That a young woman could handle so heavy a machine under such trying circumstances was considered a real feat.
     – Oshkosh Daily Northwestern; March 26, 1921.

Blanche behind the wheel.

To prove it wasn’t a fluke, she let the truck roll back down the steps, shifted into gear, and then drove it up again. Four months later, she was crowned Queen of the Mardi Gras by the American Legion at their 1921 summer frolic.

But back at the brewery, there wasn’t much to celebrate. Blanche and her siblings were stripped of their livelihood when Prohibition arrived in 1920. They scrambled to keep the business afloat and began producing and bottling fruit juices, soda, and malted milk.

The Rahrs also made non-alcoholic beer. The other Oshkosh breweries – Peoples and the Oshkosh Brewing Company – followed a similar path. But to a unique degree, the Rahr brewery became the subject of persistent rumors that some of its production bypassed the dealcoholization process. According to the gossip, that beer got funneled to bootleggers.

Blanche heard those rumors for the rest of her life. She consistently denied them. In any case, Rahr Brewing of Oshkosh was among just a handful of breweries of its size to survive the dry years.

Blanche and her brother Carl outside the brewery.

Beer became legal again in 1933. But things didn’t get a lot easier. Rahr was Oshkosh’s smallest brewery, producing up to 20,000 barrels of beer annually – about half as much beer as their cross-town competitors made.

Especially troubling was a new set of laws that forbid the Rahrs from operating their brewery in conjunction with the saloons they owned. Before Prohibition, the Rahr family had used their tied-house saloons to insulate themselves from their larger competitors. But that arrangement was made illegal in the aftermath of repeal. The struggle to survive became a never-ending ordeal.

You wouldn’t have known that if you were following Blanche. When she wasn’t at the brewery, she led a social life that was a regular feature of the Daily Northwestern’s “Women’s World” page. She participated in civic groups, became an excellent bowler, and was fanatic about the local baseball scene.

A headline from the Oshkosh Daily Northwestern, May 3, 1952.

Blanche had far-flung friends and she traveled to be with them. Among her better-known confidants were Hollywood actress Edna Bennett and Broadway stage actress Beth Merrill.

Actress Beth Merrill, a longtime friend of Blanche.

Blanche was also the person reporters went to when they were looking for news about the brewery. But her typical bluntness began to wane as the fortunes of her brewery declined. She was evasive when asked for a summary of Rahr’s 1953 business. “About the same as 1952,” She said and then went on to complain about the tax on beer.

In fact, the brewery was coming undone. Annual production had fallen well below the 10,000 barrel mark. 1954 was worse. By 1955, production had dropped to just 3,660 barrels. And in the summer of 1956, the Rahrs closed their brewery. Again, it was Blanche who shared the news. She said that, if nothing else, they could be proud that even through the leanest of years there was never a layoff.

The Rahr's Beer sign coming down at Jerry's Bar on Ceape Avenue.

Blanche was 63 when the brewery shut down. She had lived all her life in a home two doors west of the brewhouse. And there she remained.

Blanche's former home on Rahr Avenue.

Her life seems to have narrowed after the brewery went under. She became somewhat infamous for her severity when driving off wandering children attracted by the prospect of sneaking into a dormant brewery. Other explorers remembered her gruff demeanor giving way to a smile and a piece of candy.

The abandoned Rahr Brewery office.

Demolition of the brewery began in 1964. Blanche was 72 then and still living in the house two doors down. She stayed there until the summer of 1979 when she fell ill and was moved to Evergreen Manor. Miss Blanche Rahr, aged 86, died there on the Monday morning of August 13, 1979.

Riverside Cemetery.

If you'd like to know more about the story of Rahr Brewing, here's a short video I made that gives an overview of that history.