#36
FIGHTING CHANCE
08 Jul 2014 By David Fuhrmann-Lim
Swords into brewpubs: How veterans build breweries.
American soldiers can’t drink when they’re fighting overseas, but returning vets can work wonders in the brewery.
By Kelly Twedell
Among the thousands of beers that will be drank near Fort Bragg this Fourth, there will be at least one that got its start in the war zone of Iraq. Working as medics in a Baghdad hospital, becoming numb to the wounds of war that they treated around the clock, Gerald Montero and two other medics spent their downtime talking about all the beer they would drink and make upon their return. When Eric Whealton, Tito Valenzuela, and Montero all finished their tours and arrived at Fort Bragg, they found a community perfect for launching their inaugural brew, Dirtbag Ales.
A “dirtbag” is defined by Urban Dictionary as a person who is a committed to an extreme lifestyle to the point of abandoning societal norms. There is some of that in this trio of veteran brewers, and in many of the military veteran brewers across the country. An exact count of the number of veteran brewers doesn’t exist, but Small Business Association figures indicate that veteran-owned businesses are rapidly increasing as the wars of the past decade draw down, and breweries in particular are popping up…
Read more at Fast Company
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