Talk:Steam beer

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[edit] "steam" vs "California common" beer

has there been any discussion on this issue yet?

I noticed that the "steam" name is properly referred to as a trademark of Anchor Brewing, but in my opinion the entire article should be moved to "California common beer" as that is the proper name of the beer style. Allegrorondo 22:06, 7 August 2005 (UTC)

No, because the steam beer of the turn of the century did not bear much resemblance to California common beer.

If I understand correctly, the term "steam beer" originally referred to the turn-of-the-century cheap, bad-tasting beer mentioned by Jack London and Frank Norris. Everyone who has written about it indicates that people only drank it when properly brewed beer was a) unavailable, or b) too expensive. It has apparently not really been made since about 1950; the name alone was appropriated by and trademarked by Anchor for a good craft-brewed beer with little resemblance to true steam beer; and "California common beer" was invented to serve as a non-trademarked generic name for Anchor Steam and beers similar to it.

In other words, California common beer = Anchor Steam beer ≠ steam beer.

So It would be inappropriate to move the article to California common beer because the steam beer drunk around the turn of the century was not California common beer.

Either:

• (My preference) There should be one well-organized article about all the things that have been called "steam beer;" or
• The article should be split into two stubby articles, one describing true turn-of-the-century steam beer and one describing California common beer, with Anchor Steam being discussed under California common beer and referenced in the steam beer article.

Dpbsmith (talk) 00:40, 8 August 2005 (UTC)

After furthur research, I tend to agree with your option one - expand the article to include sections on

• a) historic, or true steam beer
• b) modern "California common beer", with Anchor Steam as the first example

Reasoning - the two terms are used interchangably by homebrewers,

- novice beer nuts are more likely to search "steam beer"

Although however 'bad' original steam beer was, I have to point out that some really great beer styles were the result of people looking for cheaper beers, or ways to make cheap beers palatable. :)

Allegrorondo 13:09, 8 August 2005 (UTC)