HOIST THAT STEIN!

A look back at when beer gardens were the rage.

Written by Sharon Honig-Bear

Two notable events occurred in Reno in 1868: The city was first mapped and then began to grow. It also was the year Frederick Hertlein opened the Reno Brewery. It was the first in Reno but not in Nevada. That honor goes to the Carson Brewery, founded in 1860, four years before statehood. Beer and Nevada have been linked since its earliest days — and German brewmasters led the way.

It didn’t take long for the German tradition of the beer garden to follow. As early as 1879, Reno’s El Dorado Saloon started to build a beer garden in the rear. These outdoor locations were considered an antidote to dark saloons. 

Ad for the Tavern of Sparks beer garden

As described in an editorial in the Nevada State Journal on June 30, 1887, “If all our citizens would follow the example of the hearty Germans [in] taking their wives and children with them to the beer garden … instead of selfishly going alone to a corner gin mill, their morals would be far better, we should have fewer criminals and drunkenness would be far less than it is.”

Exterior of the old Nevada Brewery (aka Schnitzer’s Brewery and Beer Garden). Courtesy of Nevada History Through Pictures

Beer gardens caught on in the early 1900s. James Bell opened one north of his brewery at the corner of Sixth and Sierra streets. Charles Frisch planned a regulation German beer garden east of town to quench the thirst of “railroad boys.” The Reno Brewery Road House and Beer Garden was popular at 1000 E. Fourth St. A beer garden was planned for the Coney Island Pleasure Resort. A slight complication arose in 1905 when Reno passed an ordinance to tax and regulate drinking establishments, including beer gardens. Licensing fees were $30 quarterly, with an additional $45 per quarter if the business offered entertainment.

Standout locales

In a tale of two cities, Reno and Virginia City’s beer gardens were a center of social life. In Reno, The McKissick Hotel at Sierra and Plaza streets added an elevator and a rooftop beer garden in 1908, and it was a posh place to be seen. 

The McKissick Hotel in Reno. Photo courtesy of the Western Nevada Historic collection

Outside Virginia City in Six Mile Canyon, people would rendezvous at Schnitzer’s Brewery and Beer Garden, also known as the Nevada Brewery. Albert Schnitzer was described as a genial brewer, famed for his Dutch dinners, which included pretzels, tripe, and limburger cheese. 

A retrospective in the Reno Evening Gazette on Nov. 21, 1942, said, “Old timers recall the gay parties in the cool shade of the beer gardens in the rear of the building, it being a gathering place for young and old for miles around.” 

Mr. Schnitzer behind the bar inside the saloon. Photo courtesy of Nevada History Through Pictures

Decades after Schnitzer’s closed, a casualty to Prohibition, it was remembered with an acclaimed stage show called Schnitzer’s Beer Garden Revue. Evoking the Gay ’90s and the popularity of beer gardens, it played to packed audiences during 1939-40 in Virginia City, Carson City, and Reno.

A post-Prohibition comeback

New taxation laws didn’t close down the fun — but Prohibition did. Brewing in Nevada virtually ceased, and beer gardens went silent after 1918. After the Volstead Act was repealed in 1933, they popped up in every direction, from the Comstock Lodge on Geiger Grade to Tahoe City, to the Richford Hotel in Gardnerville, to Dick Bright’s Beer Garden in Carson City. Two notable sites were the Vista Beer Garden “two miles east of Sparks” and The Tavern Beer Garden in Sparks, where you could “dine, dance, and romance.” 

Beer production has deep roots in Northern Nevada, and today’s craft beer movement represents a renaissance of that tradition. Bring on the beer gardens, and we will hoist a stein to that!

– Sharon Honig-Bear was the long-time restaurant writer for the Reno Gazette-Journal. She relishes Reno history and is a tour leader with Historic Reno Preservation Society. You can reach her with comments and story suggestions at Sharonbear@sbcglobal.net.