10 Toughest Coasters and
The One That Almost Got Away!

by Chris Levesque



Soon after Roger finished the last Microcosm Newsletter he asked me which micro/craft brewery coasters did I think were the “ten toughest” to come by and would I write an article on them. My quick answer to him each time he asked has been “ten that I don’t have” so therefore it is too hard to do an article.

Then he said he wanted me to do the article on the ten toughest coasters in my collection and that got me thinking it could be an interesting article to many: coaster collectors and non-collectors; micro/craft coaster collectors who follow George Barone’s website and those that don’t; and last but not least collectors of vintage coasters and other vintage breweriana who dismiss the value of micro/craft coaster collections and micro/craft breweriana collections in general.

First and foremost I would like to state that the selection of coasters and all of the comments regarding them are entirely my opinion and apply solely to me and how each coaster was acquired. I lay claim to being the “Coaster Queen” but certainly not the sole authority on micro/craft coaster collecting. So here we go and I am not going to rate “toughness” within the ten and one that almost got away.

The elusive One Onion is my most recent tough acquisition. For 15 years I have needed and sought to no avail the One Onion coaster. The hunt for this one goes back to our early micro/craft collecting days. Then a few weeks ago just like that it turned up in a collection I acquired. To me seeing, feeling, touching and actually owning this coaster made my collecting year!

Back in 1988 at the ECBA Convention in Utica, NY, Roger was going room to room and spotted a number of the “Spuds” look-a-like Pete’s Wicked Ale coasters. For those who don’t know the history of this coaster it was the first issue from Pete’s Brewing Co. The photo of the dog was used in the first marketing theme from Pete’s. As soon as it was issued to the public Anheuser Busch issued a cease and desist order to stop the use of the dog theme which they say looked too much like Spuds McKenzie. So Pete’s was early on and in no way could challenge the giant. Only a small run of this marketing theme was made public. Roger picked up all that were available in that room, which was four. We kept one for ourselves and traded the rest with collector friends for other “tough” coasters at the time. Nowadays you don’t see this coaster in most trade boxes!

Two years ago Roger and I went to California for the first time to visit friends. They are avid micro/craft brewery tourists and have a sizable collection of both vintage and micro/craft breweriana. They have been touring brewpubs and microbreweries since the very beginning. One of our friends keeps the micro coasters organized and while there I picked through their coaster trade box. That is where I picked up the Paradise Brewpub and Grill. I was quite certain it was not on George Barone’s website so I asked our friends if they remembered how they came by it. They said they picked the coaster up at the brewpub long ago but couldn’t remember exactly when. The reason I chose this for my 10 toughest is because it just got posted on the Barone website yet it has been in our friends’ collection for quite some time. They had no other traders and we along with possibly a few others who might have gotten that coaster from them are the only ones known to have it. In addition I acquired the Vintner’s Grill from Healdsburg, CA, a coaster I had been in search of for since the 80’s. There again they had picked this coaster up at the brewpub way back when in their early travels because this place was not around for any length of time.
In 2003 our good friend and micro/craft coaster trading partner Gary Feldmann passed away. Back in 1989 he was responsible for getting Roger and I into collecting the micro/craft coasters. At ECBA conventions and once at his home in DeWitt, New York we would spend four hour plus marathons trading coasters, labels, business cards…you name it anything micro/craft. Six months after his passing we received a telephone call from his wife, Edwina, asking us if we, or anyone we knew wanted Gary’s micro/craft stuff as she pretty much was ready to toss most of it because she felt there was not much value. Whoa…don’t do anything with the “stuff” until we come up to visit. Three van filled snowy day trips later to the greater Syracuse area and we were the proud owners of Gary’s micro coaster collection. We told Edwina that the micro/craft “stuff” did have value and paid her what we thought was a reasonable price. Lo and behold, Gary had the elusive Ingram’s and the tough to come by Blue Muse. I was a happy camper adding these to the collection. But hold on and look at that Alaskan Pale Ale. It looks different than any other published on the Barone website. There is no “Northern Light” printed over their logo nor any printing below it. It is a clean coaster that has never been altered. Here again is another “sleeper”…another issue that “fell through the cracks”.
 
Once Gary got us into collecting micro/craft coasters we began writing to all the micro breweries and brewpubs known to exist. Back in the 80’s it was the “birth” of the craft brew renaissance…they were opening and closing at record pace! For the most part the response to mail requests was amazing. Also at that time the beer festivals were an incredible source for coasters and all the other giveaways. We were writing to every new address we could get our hands on and we were like kids in a candy store each time we received a new issue in the mail! This is how we acquired the Bone Dry brewed by the Kessler Brewing Co. in Montana. Very often you would receive as many as a dozen coasters in response to a request which meant there were enough to trade with others. That is how we acquired the Yale Lager from the Brooklyn Brewery…in trade maybe for the Kessler Bone Dry! Those were the days! If only we knew!
 
Fast forward to this past summer. Roger and I attended the NABA Annual Convention in Bay City, MI. The convention was fairly quiet for micro/craft trading but in visiting room to room I spotted the Lighthouse Brewing Company coaster from Manistee. Now I really have no clue whether this is a tough coaster for many of you. I just know that it has been a tough coaster for me to come by. During the late 90’s Roger and I took a short lived break from actively collecting breweriana in general and there are some coasters I missed out on during this time period and the Lighthouse was one of them. After searching through hundreds of trade boxes all of a sudden I spot this coaster for sale on a table in someone’s room with absolutely no other micro/craft breweriana in it! I was thrilled.
 
Now to the one that almost got away. Before arriving at the NABA Convention in Bay City, MI we traveled with Dan and Linda Forbes and toured microbreweries and brewpubs on the west side of Michigan and all the way up to the Upper Peninsula and down the eastern side of Michigan to Bay City. It was a scenic, productive and fabulous tour of Lake Michigan, Lake Superior, and Lake Huron and their breweries. While at Mackinaw Brewing Company in Traverse City, I immediately spotted a new coaster on the bar, the 10 Year Anniversary of the Mackinaw Brewing Co. I was pretty certain this was not on the web site yet. There were maybe a dozen or so of this coaster on the bar and plenty of the 4” black Mackinaw coaster (MACK-3). I asked the bartendress if they had any more of the anniversary coaster. Her reply was “What you see is what you get” and that the coaster had been issued in June (it is now August) for their 10th Anniversary and what was on the bar was the end of them. Matter of fact she said that a whole new coaster was due in that afternoon! She also told me to help myself to what was there. So I took all there were on the bar (soiled or not) and searched other stacks at waiters’ stations and was happy I at least had some traders. Perhaps if we were there a day or two later could this have been one of the coasters that slipped through the cracks as mentioned in the last issue of the Microcosm Newsletter? This one almost got away! To add to the story on the last day of the convention at the Saturday trade show, our friend Jim Starkman visited our trade table and handed me a few coasters. I could not believe my eyes! There on top of the pile was the MACK-4 white Mackinaw coaster. I now had two new issues from Mackinaw not on the web site. The ironic part was that our friend Jim had picked up the new issue the very afternoon after we were there just like the bartendress had said.
Now take a minute and look at my face in the picture featured in this article….the smile says it all. I’m like a kid in a candy shop! I had just picked up a brand new coaster new to my collection and not as yet on Beer Coaster Mania!!!!! An added bonus is obtaining enough traders for many of my trading partner friends. Ummmmmmmmmmmmm, life is good……at least for the next ten minutes when the thrill begins to fade and the urge for the hunt for another new issue re-emerges! It’s all about the hunt!! Collecting micro/craft coasters is the best, regardless of what they are worth.
 
What are your 10 toughest coasters?
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