Beer and ale were present from the beginning in the English settlements of North. America. Records of both the London Company and the Jamestown colony indicate that beer reached the latter in 1607, its very first year of existence. But in those early years, beer was too bulky (and thus too expensive) to transport efficiently; it also spoiled in the summer heat, and so the colonists soon began brewing their own (Rorabaugh 1979: 108-9). Although barley and hops were not at hand, other basic materials that would ferment, such as persimmons, pumpkins, maize, Jerusalem artichokes, and maple sugar, were abundant in eastern. America, and by 1609, the governor of Virginia was advertising for brewers to come to the colony (Baron 1962:4).
A bit later, in Massachusetts, the Puritans - like other Europeans of the age who justifiably viewed water consumption with intense suspicion - had followed suit and were brewing their own beer. The Puritans also pioneered some of. America’s first regulatory statutes for the production, distribution, and consumption of the beverage. By 1637, taverns and inns had to be licensed by the General Court, and it was forbidden for them to brew their own product. Rather, beer was to be obtained from a commercial brewer, also licensed by the court, who was enjoined to sell at court-specified prices. By 1629, similar regulations had also been adopted in Virginia (which now had two large brewhouses).
Not that there were all that many taverns in early America, and beer was more often than not brewed and consumed in the home. Those who had access to barley or could afford to import malt from England produced something a European might recognize; other beers continued to be made from local ingredients and from West Indies molasses. In addition, beer was imported on a fairly large scale from England, or from the Netherlands in the case of New Amsterdam, where the Dutch had established beer as a prominent drink back in the 1620s.
Beer production kept pace with the growing population throughout the remainder of the seventeenth century and into the eighteenth, with Philadelphia and Boston becoming major brewing towns. As was the case in Europe, the vast majority of colonial towns had taverns that not only provided places of lodging for travelers but also served as local social centers. These dispensed some beer, but rum and (to a lesser extent) corn whiskey and cider increasingly enjoyed more appeal, and even tea, made available in quantity by British mercantilism, cut into beer consumption. Nonetheless, that consumption grew anyway in the eighteenth century because the population was growing (Baron 1962: 56-8).
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