608 Stewart Avenue, Saint Paul, Minnesota
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Fredrick Banholzer home | |
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| Address: | 680 Stewart Avenue |
| Neighborhood/s: | West 7th, Saint Paul, Minnesota, Brewery District, Saint Paul, Minnesota |
| City/locality- State/province |
Saint Paul, Minnesota |
| County- State/province: |
Ramsey County, Minnesota |
| State/province: | Minnesota |
| Country: | United States |
| Material of Exterior Wall Covering: | Brick |
| Material of Foundation: | Limestone |
(44.923195,-93.128255)
Frederick Banholzer, who was born in Wurttemberg, Germany, in 1824, had been since 1856 a busy St. Paul stone mason and contractor, working primarily around the Uppertown district. Described "as a man of great humor," Banholzer was less interested in brewing than was his son, and so after only six years in the trade he sold his interest to 30-year-old William. A rotund man with a handlebar moustache, William Banholzer "was all business." Almost single-handedly he turned a 1,000 barrel-a-year brewery into a 12,0-00 barrel-a-year operation. "Banholzer's North Mississippi Beer" became by the 1880s one of the five most popular brews in the city. The company's facilities included a total of nine buildings and a one-half-mile deep, multi-chambered cave. The cave was accessible from both the bottom of the river bluff (south of the brewery) and from the top of the cliff (right inside the plant's main stone building). Today this cave still runs from the river bank, under Shepard Road, to the vicinity of Butternut street and one can still see the old stone archway at the lower entrance - a lasting reminder of Banholzer's Brewery.
In 1886 William established "Banholzer's Park" in the empty lots north of the brewery. The park was to serve as a recreation area for neighborhood picnickers who drank at Banholzer's outdoor beer garden, and it provided barbeques, outdoor bowling, German band music, balloon rides to Lilydale and, of course, cold kegs of North Mississippi beer.
Memories and Stories
In 1887 Minnesota had 112 breweries. Saint Paul was the number one brewing center in the state.
When a brewery in the West 7th Street area was destroyed by fire, Fredrick and William Banholzer reconstructed it and made it into a successful brewery. The Banholzers dug caves that extended a half mile deep and had many chambers. But within a year after William died in 1897, the business closed.
