CAMRA's half-century and the beer revolution it inspired

I said a couple of posts ago, that I would write my own tribute to CAMRA, after the organisation notched up its 50-year milestone, so here it is. The fact that the Campaign for the Revitalisation of Ale (to use its original name), should reach its half century is quite an achievement; especially when you consider the campaign’s humble beginnings, and the fact that the idea was hatched out of what Mrs PBT’s would dismiss as "pub talk!"

You know the sort of thing, a group of blokes, and it is mainly blokes as women seem to possess a lot more sense, sitting around in a pub and trying to put the world to right. After moaning about something not being as good as it used to be (in the case of the four northern lads on holiday in Ireland, it was beer), someone then comes up with a half-baked idea, along the lines of “We should do something about it.”  following on, someone else has the even dafter idea about staring a campaign.

The rest, as they say, is history, because in that particular instance, the four friends did actually do
something, just like they said they would and, in their own unintentional way, changed the world of beer and brewing forever. Because not only did they save traditional British beer – cask-conditioned ale, or “Real Ale,” as they eventually decided to do call it, but they sparked an unprecedented, world-wide interest in beer that would elevate the status of beer, from a humble, everyday drink that no-one thought that much of, to a level which put it on level pegging with wine.

Thanks to those four fine fellows, and the countless people they picked up along the way, I can now go virtually anywhere within countries where the brewing and consumption of beer is permitted and find myself a drink of the highest quality. Proper small-batch, artisanal beer, brewed according to local traditions and produced to suite local tastes, is now readily available, and whilst big brand, multi-national beers are obviously everywhere too, it’s nice to have that choice.

It’s no exaggeration either to say this is all down to CAMRA, because what the organisation did was to light the fuse, the fuse that led to the explosion in new breweries, the resurrection of old beer styles and the bold experimentation of the craft beer movement that followed in CAMRA’s wake.

Sure there were people like Frank Baillie, Michael Jackson, Richard Boston, Roger Protz, Christopher Hutt, Peter Austin, John Young,  John & Christine Cryne, Fritz Maytag, Garret Oliver, Roger Ryman, David Bruce, Tony Ruddle, Matthias Trum, Vaclav Berka and countless others along the way, all helping and assisting in their own fashion, but without CAMRA lighting the blue touch paper that brought them altogether – however remotely, would the world of brewing be as interesting, diverse and exciting as it is today?

So, thank you Messrs Hardman, Lees, Makin and Mellor. You obviously weren’t aware what your drink-fueled conversation at Kruger’s Bar, County Kerry, Ireland on 16^th March 1971, was going to lead to, but like tens of thousands of other beer aficionados all over the world, I’m mighty glad that you acted upon it, with the determination that you did.

Other beer writers and bloggers have all paid their own tribute to this amazing achievement and put their own spin on it. These include:

Pub Curmudgeon;  Tandleman;  Jeff Bell (Stonch);  Retired Martin;  Ed's Beer Site;  Matt - When my Feet go Through the Door).

I‘m sure there are others, so if I’ve missed anyone, and you’d like me to link to your site, do please get in touch.