It's the brew podcast. It is the drive b. Brought to you by Russian River brewing and Victory House. Her linda Harass is back with us international food and beer judge. And 1 of our guests today is Renee D luca Renee, Pleasure to meet you. Very nice to be here. Thank you so much, Steve. And you are the daughter of Jack Mc macarthur. Correct. And it's all about, new A brewing, and we're tasting some recently brood, Yes. The original recipe. And your dad's recipe.
Right? Yes. Yes. Our friend Don Barclay, Brew at Men no brewing. He's here and back with us. And tell us your story. I mean, you're the daughter of a a major craft beer dude. Yeah. Your father started this in 76. Correct. That is when he incorporated New A and brewing company in Sonoma. I did not grow up with Jack. I found him a little later in life. Oh, cool. Yeah. It was a story. And when I found out what he was known for, I said, you know, I always knew I had beer in my blood, and I
wasn't wrong. I have enjoyed getting to know Jack for the last 20 some years, and we have bonded over the beer, and I now run the brewers daughter beer company, which does business as new A, and I licensed Don who was Jack's head brewer for a number of years. Right. I said, sure. Go ahead and brew some for this event that we have coming up at the museum of Sonoma County, which is happening here we'll talk more about that with Linda in a moment. You started
taking Jack Mc macarthur. U. To beer festivals and craft beer conferences and stuff. And then you helped revive the beer in 20 11. Talk about that. Of the things we've done in getting to know each other is bond over the beer. And I said, Jack, how have you ever been to a beer fest or 1 a conference around craft beer, so big these days he's like, no. I gave that all up. You know, he had kinda become this elusive figure in craft beer. Year. And I said, well, I wanna go to the Great American
beer festival in Colorado. It's an annual event in Denver here And so he came and met me out there, and we walking up and down the aisle were in 2011 where all these... Breweries are handing out samples of their beer. And I said, Jack, Look at what you started? What do you think about all this? And he said, Obama owes me a lot of money. Because, of course, back then, that's when Obama was in office and Jack's just a character, And I said, well, you started this, and then it got
word around the hall. The jack was in attendance. And Jim Cook, who is the founder of Boston Beer, Sam Adams as we know it. You got Wind of it, and he said, oh, I wanna meet Jack. So we went to the Boston beer long
shot breakfast, which is something that... Yeah. Sam Adams does every, Great American beer festival, they award a home brewer who submits their recipe with brewing their beer, and they were announcing that, And so I brought Jack to the breakfast that morning, that I got to stand there with the folks from Boston Brew their P person, and everybody else, and Jim and Jack met for the first time. And Jim said, oh, Jack, it's so great to meet you. It's like meeting Sam Adams.
In that way that Jacob has very ef vessel You know. And he said, I don't know if you know this, and I'll tell you we did not know this. He said, in when the intellectual property from New A came into the public domain after you left New A and closed the business. He goes, I retained it. Because I didn't want the big guys of beer to get the name New Album and do something with it because Jim was veer, Jack and randy A being, you know, the start of the whole craft beer movement
and he knew what it meant. So he had held onto it for all those years. What a great story. So. And we had no idea that that is what happened. And I just found that out today. I picked up Renee from the airport. And she was telling me all these stories because I'm like okay. You're gonna come on the show and there's a lot of myths out there about Chap Cola and New A. There's a lot of legends, There's a lot of myths and Legends the end. Urban legends, and you know the real stories.
Yeah. And, you know, it I got to meet her at the Smithsonian Institute when the American Beer history, at American history Museum, in 20 19 yeah 2000 and put in the the beer history museum. Mh. And Jack was there if it's many time. Jack was en ent. Yes. There is a... Display at the Smithsonian in the history news museum dc if you go there, called brewing a revolution, and it honors for May tag.
It honors Ken Gross and New, and they had a party to launch the exhibit in 2019, and we're in the same hall as Julia Child's kitchen. Which is pretty cool, man. So when the when the history, the museum of Sonoma County was gonna do this exhibit on Baron Hops. And I said, I'm actually friends with Jack Mc mcconnell S. They're like, no way. And Like, I think I might be able to get her here too. Yeah. And, of course, any opportunity come have a beer and honor jack and New A. And
I'm there for it. And Now, Jack is still alive. He lives in a corner of Northwest Arkansas where he retired, and he is in his late seventies. He's doing up okay. But not in the kind of health where he could travel. And these days, I'm more or less telling the story and keeping his name and, the legend out there. Yeah. Says here you formed the brewers daughter beer company, and you've been running things ever since. Yes. So what was Jim Cook said come to Boston.
And let's reimburse some of your original recipes, and we were like, okay. That sounds fun. So we got in touch with Don Barclay, who was the head brewer who still... Had the recipes, and we were in communication with the brewers at Boston beer, and I got to sit there and be a fly on the wall the day we did the brewing and listened to Jim Cook and Jack Mc macarthur, talk about the early days of craft beer while they were busy bring it. And john John Hall, the beer writer we there and
really about it. And it was just an amazing experience, and then they released the beer a year later was and brought Jack out with Jim at the next Jb in 2012 and released the story to the world, and they did a little beer tour. Renee, Dawn Broccoli, and my father and I are gonna go down to the russian pub tonight afterwards and do a meat and greet. So if you wanna come meet... Renee, Jack Mc S and Don Barkley. We won't have the beer, but you can come to the beer Festival Saturday.
To try the beer... Renee, the Vip part Starts at 4, and Renee is gonna tap the c herself, How cool is that? Yay. At 04:30, and it goes 4 to 8, so a lot nicer and colder. I some memorabilia that I had, including the original handmade, new A point of sale sign that Jack used to make and anyone that was carrying his beer, he would make this handmade sign. And so I donated 1 of those to the exhibit and an original new A t shirt. The t shirt I'm wearing that says new A is from the updated beer.
But, yeah. So that was a lot of fun rebooting it. And then Jim cooked did this amazing thing and said, you know, Jack you were a little ahead of the time, and a lot of us made a lot of money on your idea. So they had released the new A that Boston Beer made around the country, and he gave my father all of the proceeds from the sale of that beer. Holy moly. And he gave him all the intellectual property back, He said it belongs stayed you. That's so cool. Yeah. She
is Renee D luca. She is the daughter of Jack Mc. New A brewing company is acknowledged to be the first post Prohibition micro brewery in the United States, and Jack Mc mcconnell founded it in 19 76, Where did you grow up and where do you live now, Renee? Oh, thank you for asking. I was an adapt d, which is why I at. Jack later in life. I was raised by a very wonderful couple in suburban Washington, Dc. They were from Ohio. Virginia. Maryland actually. Think. Yeah. Right. Suburban Dc.
And so I went to College in Ohio and accidentally stayed for 30 years, and I live in Cleveland, Ohio. And have, really done some cool things with New A and some of the brewers there. Cleveland has a great beer. But I ended up working and live radio and Tv in Cleveland for many years. You know, I believe that because you're really great right now. I'm the show and, you know, radio You. The story a few times. Yeah. Renee D luca with us, and her Linda talked more about what's going on
at the museum of Sonoma County. The exhibit goes all the way till September first, and then we're gonna try to go over to the site where her father started the brewery in the town of Sonoma. Which I've never walked through either. So this Saturday from 4 to 8, you can park across the street at the mall. It's right near the mall. People don't ask me, What do you mean? There's a museum of Sonoma County. It's beautiful. It's got columns and wood, and it's art
d and Marble. And from what I understand, it's associated with the Smithsonian. It's this Smithsonian and philly. It was the post office it was built in 19 16. It was a Santa rosa post office. And the sculpture guard, and they they have the whole land on there that yeah from when they moved the museum over back in the seventies.
They moved it over there, and it's all fence in, and we're gonna have the beer festival in the sculpture garden cooler time of day, 4 to 8 Nice, along these different coal sculptures that are out there and the redwood trees are shade, russian river brewing, pouring, light and sponsor are also they're pouring as well. Like an is a sponsor their point. We're gonna have some different local Pod farm brewing actually because they have a, they're actually
part of 1 of the other exhibits. U. And Bruce Callum from Ke Brew housing to come, He's gonna come to the festival that's gonna be kinda... Cool. Yeah guy. Yeah. Him and his wife are gonna be there, they're gonna be in the Vip part. So, at 04:30... So if you go on, that museum so c dot org, or on their Facebook page as well, you can get... The Vip is sold out. If you've got your vip ticket if you win,
come down there. If you're in the news biz, and you wanna can take some photographs and things like that and meet Renee and try this historic beer, let it let them know when you're checking then because we would like to get the word out about this because what we really wanna do eventually is get a historical landmark, a real 1, because this is history is national history. Yeah. Not just California, or Sonoma County has. And marking sonoma, this is where this craft beer revolution
started. That's just so cool. Well, yeah. And your dad Jack Mc macarthur started new A brewing company in the town of sonoma. Yeah. So he was in the navy in the late sixties, and he was stationed in Scotland. He was a welder alps. For the nuclear submarines, and he would go into town in the evening and take part in enjoy the porter ale and staffs of Scotland. And he learned to brew while he was
there. And then he was discharged to Northern California from the navy and was living in sonoma, and all there was to drink at that era was bud miller course. Yeah. And he said, well I guess if I want to drink those wonderful porter ai and stout, I have to brew them myself. So that's the inspiration for New A, the name new A, Sir Francis Drake when he, you know, found north in California. He named it new A. I don't know if
you're knew that. And then the ship he was on was the Golden Hi, and that is the ship in that became part of the label of new album bringing Okay. So my dad had a sense of history and very to Impart that to the beer. And he retired. To what Northern Arkansas? Yeah. He's in Northwest Arkansas... So after he left New A, he went to the banks about 8 years into his... Endeavor, and they didn't understand what he was doing. They said, you know, starting a new
beer company. It's like starting a new car company and going against Ford and Chevy. Why would you do that? Yeah. He, no. You don't understand doing something different, but they didn't finance them. So he did go to work with folks at Mend Brewing company for a while, and he was 1 of the folks that created Red tail Ale, which was 1 of their flagship. Bruce. 1 of my favorite beers of all time wave. But Jack didn't really like working for other people.
And so he went off he was an engineer by trade and went off and did other things and kind of was a little bitter and disappeared from the beer world until I've... Found him was reunited with him as an ind. My birth mother put me in touch with him long road to that... Old were you when you finally met your dad. So I found Linda found my birth mom when I was 30 years old. Wow, And a couple years later was reunited with Jack, who did not know of my existence.
Wow when he found out about it, he said it's a communist conspiracy. But he and his family were very warm and welcoming to me and it is been a wonderful journey. And then we brew the beer, and I started bringing him to these conferences and events, and people like, oh, check Mc macarthur is still around. Jim Cook gave us the Llc property back. Jackson said Renee, I wanna do anything with this. I'm retired.
So why don't you run with it and I have, and I've re brew some of the beers with some Ohio breweries in the meanwhile. And the money that Jim Cook gave Jack, he was able to build a little retirement home on his sister's property in Northwest Arkansas. Which he was on disability at that point. And so that is how he ended up in Northwest argument, which he really enjoys. So tell me what you were saying? About when people message you, they're usually messaging from California or the
west. Because because California gets it more. They do. And and while it's been very well received in Ohio, and I lived in North carolina for a little while and Raleigh Brewing, actually brew the beer we had at the Is Smithsonian event. I brew with Raleigh Brewing. I've had Carolina partnerships with all these breweries east of the Mississippi, but it's the people from California that write to me the most and say, when are you gonna bring New A back to California.
Want it? We miss it. Yeah. I believe that. Yeah. That makes sense. It was very popular. She is Renee to Luca? We're talking about new a Brewing company, her father, Jack Mc macarthur founded new A in the town sonoma in 19 76. There's a lot going on, We'll talk more about the big thing at the museum of Sonoma County.