{"id":726,"date":"2019-09-14T12:43:44","date_gmt":"2019-09-14T12:43:44","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.spoonerrow.cc\/?page_id=726"},"modified":"2019-09-26T17:47:12","modified_gmt":"2019-09-26T17:47:12","slug":"corstons-ginger-beer","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/www.spoonerrow.cc\/?page_id=726","title":{"rendered":"Corstons Ginger Beer"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Today you might know ginger beer as a\ncarbonated drink that is flavoured primarily with ginger and then sweetened\nwith sugar (or now often with artificial sweeteners) but did you know that\noriginally it was an alcoholic beverage fermented from ginger spice, yeast and\nsugar.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Brewed ginger beer\noriginated in Yorkshire in the mid-18th century and became popular\nthroughout Britain, with soldiers exporting the taste to the United States,\nIreland, South Africa and Canada.  It\nreached its peak of popularity in the early 20th century as a largely carbonated drink.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Back then there were many manufacturers and distributors throughout England and it may interest you to know that we had such a manufacturer could be found here in the village of Spooner Row, at a shop located at the bottom of Queen\u2019s Street.  The firm of Corston’s owes its origin to one Harriet Corston, who had set up a cottage industry brewing ginger beer at Spooner Row sometime between 1879 and 1883.  It was then that Harriet began making \u201cOlde Style Brewed Ginger Beer\u201d<\/em> in a warehouse next to her shop.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

She made the ginger beer from sugar,\ncrushed ginger, sliced lemons, and egg white. There was none of today’s\npreservatives, or additives, and not an E number in sight. The initial mix was\nfermented with yeast for about 12 hours, and then passed through a swansdown\nfilter bag into an open earthenware pot. When it was ready to be bottled the\n‘bottler’ dipped a half pint jug into the pot, and poured the liquid into stone\nbottles. These were corked, tied with string, and stacked in a corner to mature\nbefore being sold.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Of course, the stone bottles, now\ncollector’s items, were returned for reuse. To ensure that the bottles were\nclean, they were placed in the copper, covered with water, and brought nearly\nto the boil. Getting them onto the draining board needed skill, a short iron\npoker, pointed at one end, was inserted into the mouth of each bottle, to lift\nit out. This thriving cottage industry was a typical example of those found in\nrural areas in the late 19th century, with local women providing the labour\nforce.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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By 1890 her son Jonathan had taken over the brewing side, leaving Harriet to manage the shop.  A few years later he moved the operation to Waterloo House in Bunwell Street where he was also to trade as a family grocer, draper and general warehouse man.  Trade went well and in 1898 Jonathon Corston bought an Aerated Water business from George Tattam of Attleborough. His purchase included all of the machinery, amongst which was a steam engine, and a Ginger Beer machine. There were also 6 syrup pans with strap; filters; a ginger beer press; and lead pipes and fittings. I don’t know the EEC would make of that!. To complete the equipment were 300 dozen bottles, essence and labels. Also included was a cart and harness but no mention of a horse.  This and more cost the grand total of \u00a345. Mr Tattam agreed not to start a similar business within a 12 mile radius.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Bunwell Post Office ca.1910 <\/figcaption><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n

It is Jonathan Corston that is first\nlisted in Kelly\u2019s Directory as Grocer and Draper at the Post Office in Bunwell\nStreet in 1892.  By 1900 he was also\nlisted as a Mineral Water Manufacturer and continued thus until the 1908\nedition.  <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Regular deliveries of pop were made to\nAttleborough, Banham, Mulbarton and other nearby villages, using, of course,\nthe horse and cart. Jonathon, a modern day tycoon, continued to expand his\nbusiness. In 1902 he acquired the business of Parker & Son, which included\ntheir premises on Browick Road, Wymondham. Parkers had been established as a\ngrocers and drapers based at Browick Road in Wymondham, going back as far as\n1809.  Jonathan changed the name to J\nCorstons & Co and merged the beer and lemonade parts of the business into a\nsingle location, choosing to erect a new factory at Wymondham and equipping it\nwith state of the art machinery.  Keeping\nthe manager Mr.J. Cross as a partner, and changing the name to ‘J.Corston &\nCo.’ he moved the Bunwell operation to the new factory at Browick Road. The\nrange of pop widened, the popularity of it and the ginger beer continued to\ngrow, so new machinery was installed and deliveries were extended as far as the\nhorse drawn vehicles would allow.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The business flourished up until\nJonathan died in January 1919, soon after the Great War and it was taken over\nby his son Wesley Corston.  Ginger Beer\nand other fizzy drinks continued to be popular, the factory was extended, more\nmachinery installed. With the need for deliveries further afield, and the pace\nof the modern world, the horse drawn vehicles was replaced. First deliveries\nwere by van, and then by lorry. Deliveries were made to Norwich daily (fresh\npop obviously being the best), and more than half of Norfolk was covered in\ntotal. The firm ceased to produce soft drinks in 1977. His only child, a daughter\ntrained to be a doctor, expressing no interest in continuing to run the family\nbusiness. So after 3 generations, Corston & Co. was sold to Palmer &\nHarvey who subsequently resold the premises for use as a milk depot. There is\nthus no trace of ginger beer in Spooner Row or Wymondham anymore. After more\nthan 60 years in the soft drink trade Wesley Corston retired, aged 92, in\n1980.   <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Mr W Corston and his wife were regular\nattendees at the Methodist Chapel on Chapel Road up until his death in 1979, aged\n92.  Wesley appears to have had an\ninteresting life in that the National Archive Centre at Kew holds a record of a\nWesley Corston of the same date of birth registered as an \u201cairman\u201d between 1918\nand 1928.  <\/p>\n\n\n\n

A reminder of Corstons today can be\nfound in the glass bottles that bear their name.  Those bottles manufactured for Bunwell (circa\n1893 \u2013 1902) bear the name \u201cJ. CORSTON BUNWELL\u201d, with many having an internal\nstopper.  Later bottles bear the name of\n\u201cJ. CORSTON WYMONDHAM\u201d.  The ginger beer\nwould be held in stoneware.  There is\nalso reference made to soda water siphons printed with the name of the Bunwell\nCompany.  The metal topped soda siphons\nwere made by British Syphon Co Ltd of London and branded back to the retailer by way\nof its name etched onto the main glass body and its name engraved into the\nmetal collar.  Later designs used both\nblack and then white plastic for the valve body.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

And if you ever wondered how they\nfilled an internal stopper bottle, well it is filled upside down!  The Codd-neck bottle, invented by Hiram Codd\nin 1872, had a marble and rubber washer enclosed within the neck.  As it was filled upside down the marble\nstopper was kept in place by the pressure of the gas in the bottle when turned right\nside up.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Many thanks to Peter Day of Bunwell for the\nBunwell side of this story, whilst thanks to Alison Peters for the original\nresearch.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Today you might know ginger beer as a carbonated drink that is flavoured primarily with ginger and then sweetened with sugar (or now often with artificial sweeteners) but did you know that originally it was an alcoholic beverage fermented from ginger spice, yeast and sugar. Brewed ginger beer originated in Yorkshire in the mid-18th century and […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":826,"parent":0,"menu_order":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"footnotes":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.spoonerrow.cc\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages\/726"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.spoonerrow.cc\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.spoonerrow.cc\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/page"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.spoonerrow.cc\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.spoonerrow.cc\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=726"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/www.spoonerrow.cc\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages\/726\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":890,"href":"https:\/\/www.spoonerrow.cc\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages\/726\/revisions\/890"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.spoonerrow.cc\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/826"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.spoonerrow.cc\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=726"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}