Yangna - El Aliso - Maier Brewery (site) (Los Angeles, California)

USA / California / Vernon / Los Angeles, California
 interesting place, historical layer / disappeared object
Former sites of the Tongva village of Yangna, largest of about 100 native villages in the area, and of El Aliso, a roughly 400-year-old, six-story-high sycamore tree under which Tongva leaders would gather for conferences. It was also known as the "council tree."

Settlers in the area would eventually chop up the village until in 1836, what was left of the village was a small triangle of under 100 feet per side. In 1846, even this was taken away: the city relocated who was left of the village inhabitants across the Los Angeles River near the intersection of Cesar E. Chavez Avenue and Mission Road.

In 1875, the Philadelphia Brew House was built here. This brewery would eventually become Maier and Zobelein Brewery. The brewery - known for its Brew 102 and other brands of beer - stood on the plot for more than a century and housed a bottling plant, malt house, refrigeration cellars and a stable and blacksmith shop for horse-drawn delivery wagons. The foundation for Maier Brewing was laid in 1882 when brewer George Zobelein joined with German immigrant Joseph Maier to create the Maier and Zobelein brewery, a workplace so congenial that samples of beer were delivered to employees throughout the day.

After Maier's death in 1904, his share of the company went to his two sons; Zobelein eventually left over a bitter disagreement. Younger son Eddie became the head of the renamed Maier Brewing Co. after his older brother, Fred, died in 1910. At that time, Eddie also inherited the Vernon Tigers, a baseball team in the Pacific Coast League, which served double duty as advertising for Maier's beer. The brewery, after enjoying an upswing in sales after World War II with the creation of Brew 102 -- the cheapest beer in town -- and subsequent decline as Angelenos turned to foreign and premium beers, was demolished in the 1980s.

As for El Aliso, it died in 1892. As a young boy, Charles Gibbs Adams, who would later become one of LA's first landscape architects, counted the rings after the tree was chopped down and counted 400.

articles.latimes.com/2002/sep/08/local/me-then8
articles.latimes.com/2005/jun/09/local/me-brewery9
Nearby cities:
Coordinates:   34°3'11"N   118°13'57"W

Comments

  • Photos are of the old Meier and Zobelein Brewery, the first from 1924 and a second undated but earlier drawing.
  • This was the place where Maier Brewing made the infamous "Brew 102," perhaps the worst beer ever bottled. You'd be driving down the Hollywood Freeway and have to make a sharp swerve to the left to avoid plowing into the Brew 102 sign on the side of the building. You see, they actually built the freeway around the brewery, because it was there first. It's jingle went like this: "More than 100 beers we did brew, Perfecting the new finer Brew 102. In the East and the West, Maier Beer is the best. Wonderful, wonderful Brew 102." Yeah, right.
This article was last modified 12 years ago