Cover Image: Postcard of Schutz & Hilger’s Brewery in Jordan, 1940. SCHS Collection.
The following is from “As I Remember Scott County,” a collection of oral histories from Scott County’s senior residents in the 1980s. In this selection, Johanna Herder Duestermann shares her knowledge about Jordan’s local breweries. It has been slightly edited from the original for clarity.
Frederick Heiland took a homestead in the Jordan area in the late 1850s. He came from Leipzig in the German province of Saxony, where he had been a brewmaster. After establishing himself on a farm for some years, he moved to Jordan shortly after the Civil War to join a Mr. Berk, who ran a small brewery on the south end of Jordan on Highway 21.
Berk had begun to build caves back into the hills behind his building. There, the temperature was constant and conditions were ideal for aging the beer. Frederick Heiland took complete control of the business around 1873, and in a short time, enlarged the caves to their present 300-foot lengths. He installed ventilation for them to the tops of the hills. Frederick died in 1881, and his widow and children hired a German immigrant, a Mr. Piemeisel, to manage the business. In 1890, Piemeisel retired, and Frederick’s oldest son, John, took over. William Koschel, another German immigrant and expert brewmaster, as well as a good friend of Jacob Schmidt of Schmidt’s Company, helped run the operation.
John had also heard of a Bohemian named Pilney, who was skilled at the difficult art of making the malt used in the brewing process. He was so impressed with Pilney’s work that he brought him over from Bohemia to work for him.
John operated the brewery until 1904, when he sold it to brewmasters Koschel and Mesenbrink, who had been farming in the Jordan area. The brewery operated under that management until Prohibition was passed [in 1920].
About the same time that Frederick Heiland was taking over his business in 1873, another brewery was being erected by Sebastian Gehring, who, with a man named Pier, began a competitive business. Gehring soon took over sole ownership of the firm and named it Sand Creek brewery, but sold it to Peter Schutz and his brewmaster, Kaiser, in 1885. Schutz and Kaiser ran the brewery until the turn of the century.
At that time, Kaiser died, and a man named Peter Hilgers joined Schutz. They operated the second brewery until Prohibition, and opened again in the 1930s with the repeal of the Volstead Act [also known as the National Prohibition Act]. The last beer was brewed in the Schutz-Hilgers plant during WWII. The ruins can still be seen today.
Schutz & Hilger’s beer label, 1940. SCHS Collection.
The Koschel-Mesenbriink building was completely destroyed during the Prohibition years, when what is now Highway 21, was straightened and routed through the brewery property.
The two breweries carried on a tradition of beermaking in the “Old Country” style. Jordan had a bountiful supply of pure spring water, and the malt used in the brewing process was made from barley bought from local farmers. This made a rich lager beer.
The two breweries also initiated social festivities that brought people from miles around to Jordan. They constructed a large round pavilion dance hall on the site across the highway from the brewery ruins, which is now Mini Met Ball Park. The pavilion drew people from the Twin Cities who would travel there by boat on the weekends.
Beer was sold by the barrel and delivered by both companies in the famous large brewery wagons pulled by horses in teams of four and six. They had to weigh at least 1,700 pounds. Gravel roads were rare at this time, so wagons often became stuck in the mud. Most of the business was done with saloons. Free delivery and ice was provided to their customers, as well as free hot water to clean the copper coils through which the beer passed in the saloons. Deliveries were made to Green Isle, Blakeley, Belle Plaine, Henderson, and Arlington, but most of the business was done in Jordan.
The ruins of the Schutz & Hilger’s Brewery can be seen in the right center of the image during a flood in 1960. SCHS Collection.