OLD NEWS

'Bevo' has lots of tales to share

An ad for Bevo, Anheuser- Busch's near-beer, from the July 29, 1916 Arkansas Gazette.
An ad for Bevo, Anheuser- Busch's near-beer, from the July 29, 1916 Arkansas Gazette.

One hundred years ago, a mutt wandered up to some firefighters at their station in downtown Little Rock, and a reporter for the Arkansas Gazette was Johnny on the spot to witness what ensued.

To appreciate the sly humor in the story he wrote for the July 31, 1916, Gazette, we need to know three things:

• Arkansas banned the manufacture and sale of alcohol in 1915, five years before the rest of the nation embraced Prohibition.

• The Anheuser-Busch brewing company of St. Louis survived Prohibition in part thanks to Bevo, a near-beer it insisted was not a near-beer but a "cereal beverage."

• Bevo was ballyhooed by a big marketing campaign in July and August 1916.

Here's the story.

"Bevo" Is Name

Firemen Select for Stray Hound

"'We can't have the real stuff in the station house but they can't deny us the suggestion and the memories,' remarked a fireman at Central Fire Station, Markham and Arch streets, yesterday afternoon. The 'memory' and the 'suggestion' were embodied in a name given to a stray pup. The moniker hung on the pup was none other than 'Bevo.'

"'Bevo' carries with it the memories of days gone by -- for Little Rock at least -- and the fact that it is put out by a famous brewing concern lends to this imaginary enchantment. It is a dry town drink, and strictly non-intoxicating.

"The pup wandered into the station yesterday morning. He was immediately adopted after a lengthy discussion as to his possible pedigree. A mixture of dachshund, fox terrier and several other breeds, the pup defied them to name his nationality. They didn't.

"The puppy, however, proved himself ungrateful. After he had been given a bath and generously fed on chicken hash, he disappeared. The men believe they are hoodooed on mascots. Last week a newly adopted kitten was killed by one of the trucks."

NEW AND NOT NEW

The news about that poor kitten dampens the humor, but still I can hear the firemen enjoying their little joke. What manner of beast was Bevo? Whatever it was, it wasn't beer.

If the very large advertisements Anheuser-Busch and its Little Rock distributor, the A. Karcher Candy Co., placed in the Gazette in that long-ago July can be believed, "Bevo, the Drink Triumphant" contained the "soluble substance of wholesome cereals and Saazer Hops." It was a health drink and "a new creation of science and nature."

It had "real food value" and was "a pure drink."

"This," ads stated, "means more than that it contains pure and harmless ingredients -- it means that, though you might often well be afraid of possible germs in milk or water, Bevo, being a pasteurized product in sterilized bottles, is absolutely free of bacteria."

So much healthier than germ water.

Each bottle bore a paper seal adorned with a cartoon fox gnawing a mutton shank and holding a stein. Ads warned, "Guard Against Substitutes. Have the bottle opened in front of you, first seeing that the seal is unbroken and the crown top bears the Fox."

The feasting fox, Renard, was modeled after a clever character in European folk tales noted for its survival skills. But as Anheuser-Busch's excellent ad campaign continued into December, the company met head-on any suggestion it was being crafty: "Now comes Bevo -- a cereal beverage, not a 'near-beer,' nor do we seek its sale on any basis of being an evasion of the law or of being a substitute for anything. It is offered for what it is -- a delightful, wholesome and nutritious drink."

WIDELY EMBRACED

In August, when Army National Guard troops departed Fort Roots in North Little Rock for Deming, N.M., to guard the border against Pancho Villa, they had their entertainment well trained:

"Company A, First Regiment, of Heber Springs, has a double quartet that dispenses harmony freely," the Gazette reported, "and its rehearsals in the company mess tent yesterday attracted numerous guardsmen, despite the rain. The First Regiment band has inaugurated a novel musical number. The members have filled 'Bevo' bottles to various heights with water, so that by blowing in them different notes are produced. With a clarinet to carry the air, creditable music is produced."

Over the years, Bevo also was a broad target for humor (the lyrics of "Ya Got Trouble" in The Music Man are only one instance). In Ernest Hemingway's short story "The Killers" (dated 1927, and he lived at Piggott off and on from 1927 to 1940), two guys sit down in Henry's lunchroom:

"Got anything to drink?" Al asked.

"Silver beer, bevo, ginger-ale," George said.

"I mean you got anything to drink?"

Then there's the mystery of who named the modern-day University of Texas mascot Bevo. Some have claimed that vandals from Texas A&M University branded the Austin school's pet Longhorn with an Aggie winning score -- 13-0 -- in 1917, and resourceful UT students fixed the marks to read "Bevo."

Another theory is that the name comes from "beeves," an antiquated plural of beef.

But here's the thing: An alumnus presented the first "Bevo" steer to the school before a Thanksgiving game -- in 1916. (An archival edition of the school newspaper offers proof: bit.ly/2aerOxu)

NOT-NEW NEWS

Where did Anheuser-Busch get the name?

An article in the July 1916 American Leader claimed that August A. Busch had told the author Bevo was named for "a pretty little barmaid" at an inn in Germany. But other sources, including Daniel Okrent's Last Call: The Rise and Fall of Prohibition (2010), say it derives from pivo, the Bohemian (Czech) word for beer.

If I knew nothing about the history of Bevo beyond what I've read in old Gazettes, I could tell you the campaign to sell it in 1916 was a wee bit hyperbolic -- about its health effects, possibly, but definitely about its age: Bevo wasn't new. Ads for it had appeared already in the Gazette eight years earlier.

I found one- and two-column display ads for the "non-intoxicating" Bevo in editions from 1908 and 1909, when Missouri's Legislature was considering prohibiting alcohol. So the 1916 campaign was a reintroduction.

The marketing of health tonics also was nothing new for the St. Louis brewer. Beer ads of the 1890s tout the company's low-alcohol "Malt-Nutrine" -- but also its "Black & Tan" brew -- as perfect for nursing mothers and "the weak," recommended, ads said, by "the best" doctors.

Drink a bottle a day to gain 2 to 5 pounds a week.

I wonder if that still works ...

Next week: He May Seek Toga

ActiveStyle on 08/01/2016

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