Vintage Monday – Cool Vintage Beer Cans
Hello, friends! I have missed blogging and having projects to share with you. I have found my cancer diagnosis to be all consuming and between going to many, many appointments and worrying about my health, I just haven’t had the heart to be creative or to write a blog post.
At the beginning of 2017, I worked hard to organize my part of the basement. Building two DIY 2×4 Shelving Units gave me a place to store some of my treasures and those shelves, along with some purging has left my side of the basement looking much better.
When I was organizing, I rediscovered part of Mr. SP’s childhood beer can collection and I thought that my vintage loving friends might be interested in seeing a few of them. Mr. SP’s collection was once larger but he gave many cans in his collection to a friend and his dad gave away more of the collection when he moved.
The Schmidt beer cans are my favorite. Mr. SP shares how he acquired them:
During a family vacation out west in the mid-1970’s, my father indulged my beer can collecting hobby by stopping at local liquor stores each evening and looking for unique cans. I distinctly remember stopping in South Dakota at a small town liquor store where the owner allowed us to break open cases of Schmidt beer to seek different can designs. At that time, Schmidt beer cans were printed in a number of outdoor and wildlife scenes. I don’t recall how many different designs there were, but I believe that I had acquired about 10-15 different cans. We punctured holes in the bottom of the cans to get the beer out, to maintain the tabs intact.
I really like the graphics on these cans and on occasion have used a few in seasonal vignettes around my house.
I wonder how many designs were issued back in the 1970’s?
I don’t recall much about North Star Beer. It was a Midwest regional beer, brewed in Minnesota. Point was a small time brewery in Wisconsin. It was very much on par with Leinenkugel at that time. Though Leinenkugel now thrives nationally, I think Point is still primarily a Midwest regional beer.
These were collector’s cone top cans produced for the Cicero, Illinois, houby (mushroom) festival. They were produced at the height of the beer can collecting craze in the mid-70’s. At the time, Cicero was almost exclusively of Bohemian/Czech ancestry, and held a festival honoring the “the treasured fall ingredient for many Bohemian families.” Evidently, the festival endures, and just had the 48th annual festival last Fall.
These were old cone top beer cans found in the woods in suburban Chicago. Chicago had a great many brewers through much of the 20th century. Sadly, many of those have disappeared. Most of these old cone tops represent Chicago, or Midwest, brewers. It is actually remarkable how good of condition these cans are for being discarded in the elements for 30-40 years.
I hope you enjoyed today’s Vintage Monday post. It feels good to have something to share with you.
If you like Vintage, you may also enjoy these Vintage Monday posts:
You always have the coolest collectibles! My, how beer cans have changed! What a neat look back!
I’m glad that some of these were saved. It is interesting how cans have changed over the years.
I really like those Schmidt ‘s outdoor series also.I put my cans out seasonally too .When the flat top ones came out and the early 70’s they only made 17 different ones . Later the “crimped” can version that you have pictured had 21 cans . I’m a Michigander, these cans remind me of of hunting , fishing ,they just scream mid – west ! ?
Thank you so much for commenting. My husband has fond memories of collecting beer cans with his dad. He gave most of his collection away but thankfully kept these awesome Schmidt cans.