The Underground Beer City

Cincinnati has always had beer breweries, but in the 1840s, there was an influx of German immigrants who aged their lager at cooler temperatures. To get the conditions required, they built huge facilities underneath the surface, which got larger and larger as the demand for their product increased. But it wasn't a perfect system, and innovations had to be made over time to make them safe- not from collapse, because they are pretty strong, but from carbon dioxide and ammonia, in addition to industrial accidents. The brewers dealt with all that, but they couldn't withstand the forces of discrimination against German descendants that came with World War I and with Prohibition that soon followed. These underground factories, warehouses, and tunnels are now close to 200 years old, and mostly empty. But Cincinnati is starting to regain its reputation for beer. (via Laughing Squid)