Penn Brewery

While some asslicking cockwhores are moving out of the city of Pittsburgh, some fine, upstanding citizens are going to great lengths to keep Pittsburgh brewing traditions alive.

Now that doesn't say much in that article I linked to, so I'll give you the scuttlebutt I've heard around town.  Cause, you know, it's just a blog.  What the fuck do you want from me, journalism?

The story I heard was that Tom Pastorius, founder and owner, who played with his band many Friday nights at the brewpub, wanted to retire.  He wasn't greedy, he just wanted to have fun with his life and he'd made as much money as he felt he needed.  I admire that.  But anyway, stories I heard had Tom retiring to do... whatever the hell he felt like.  So he sold Penn Brewery to some folks who thought they could continue on his good work.  But Tom didn't actually own the building, just the company; and the landlords wanted to write up a new lease for the new owners that included numerous anal violation clauses, and few to no lubrication addendums.  So the new owners started looking at moving or selling out.  (I don't really blame them for that, it sounded like a raw deal to me).  But Tom wasn't really cool with that, he wanted Penn Brewery to stay in Pittsburgh.  He'd started that place to be a Pittsburgh institution.

In Februray, his worst fears came to fruition.  The folks who bought it sold the bottling line and moved production to Wilkes-Barre.

This is not what Tom wanted.  In fact, he had gone on record saying that he didn't want the brewery to end when he retired.  So, he got together with some other investors, got a grant from the city's urban renewal initiative (to the tune of $300k), and bought the fucking place back.  Awesome!

Now, I understand that not everyone can afford to be so selfless and dedicated to community.  I sure can't.  But even if you can't do something like Tom to try to give back to a community, the least you could do is not shit all over it.  I'm talking about begging favors in the name of community, then pulling stakes, leaving disgusting amounts of debt, jobless locals, and a vacant building in a barely recovering part of town.  Yes, I'm still bitter about that.  And I will be until they either move back into a depressed area of Pittsburgh or rename their beer "Pissy Swill sold by Shady, Backstabbing Bastards".

Such can not be said about Tom Pastorius.  Brewermaster, entrepreneur, yinzer, awesome dude.  Here's to you!

So that's the story as I heard it, and I have now done my part to usher in the death of journalism by spewing unchecked facts and rumors into the blogosphere.  Feel free to read about what really happened but it will probably be less entertaining.

Sorry if you started reading this before I was done, I hit some key combination that posted it in the middle of writing.