HISTORY IN BEER Germans make many things well, and beer is among their greatest achievements. Its exact origins have been lost among thousands of groggy mornings and sledgehammer headaches, but this is what scholars now believe about beer's history.
c. 20,000 B.C. Og of Url eats a handful of yeast with his gruel and water. He is hailed as the Father of Beer and Life of the Party at his funeral the next day.
c. 11,000 B.C. Herman of Villendorf drinks 12 steins of lager in 1.79 seconds, breaking the world record. His Subsequent belch also sets a record, killing 28.
c. 6000 B.C. Henrik the Effete, the first beer connoisseur, invents the sip. He is banished to France.
c. 1516 B.C. The German Purity Law is written to protect the quality of beer. Anyone caught drinking Coors is spanked to death by a 300-pound barmaid.
500 A.D. Huns descend on Germany looking for riches, virgins, pretzels, and a genuine fire-brewed beer with no aftertaste.
501-1870 Hun celebration
1871 Otto von Bismarck settles Germany's major dispute and unites the nation with his decree on Dinkel Acker Light: Tastes great and less filling.
1961 Berlin Wall erected. East German government bans every brand of beer except Harnburgh. The party appears to be over.
1990 East Germans, hearing rumors about the classic taste of ice-cold Spaten, knock down the Berlin Wall, party nonstop and run up a six-billion-dollar bar tab.
