This silent footage shows the Sick’s Brewery’s hop cultivation and harvesting operation. The Sick Brewery existed only for a short time from 1943-1953. It was founded by Alberta brewer Emil Sick, who purchased the brewery of the Salem Brewing Association located in Salem, Oregon. The Salem location expanded the reach of Sick’s empire, which included breweries in Washington State and Montana. “Sick’s Select Beer” was produced in quantity, with the Salem brewery producing up to 27 million bottles per year until it closed in 1953. The brand continued to be made at the Century Brewery in Seattle, under the name Sicks’ Seattle Brewing & Malting Co., up until about 1966.
It’s unclear why this particular footage was shot, but likely that it was made for a promotional film about the Sick’s Brewery. The footage is especially noteworthy because it contains footage of African American and other agricultural workers who were not often portrayed in industrial films in this era.
Highlights include:
:25 Sick’s Select Hops sign
1:19 African American workers carrying bags of hop seedlings
2:33 inspection of the bagged crop
4:30 sweeping panorama of Salem, Oregon agricultural area, and aerials of the farm
8:13 prepping soil for the planting of hops
8:50 workers prepping overhead for planting
9:30 planting performed by white and African American workers
12:35 biplane conducts crop dusting operation on the crop
19:00 processing machine to separate hops from the plant
34:00 bagging processed hops
38:37 men attempting to start old International tractor
39:00 men walking past fully mature hop plants on the gantry
39:50 close up on mature hop flowers
Hops are the flowers (also called seed cones or strobiles) of the hop plant Humulus lupulus[1], a member of the Cannabaceae family of flowering plants.[2] They are used primarily as a bittering, flavouring, and stability agent in beer, to which, in addition to bitterness, they impart floral, fruity, or citrus flavours and aromas.[3] Hops are also used for various purposes in other beverages and herbal medicine. The hop plant is a vigorous, climbing, herbaceous perennial, usually trained to grow up strings in a field called a hopfield, hop garden (nomenclature in the South of England), or hop yard (in the West Country and US) when grown commercially. Many different varieties of hops are grown by farmers around the world, with different types used for particular styles of beer.
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This film is part of the Periscope Film LLC archive, one of the largest historic military, transportation, and aviation stock footage collections in the USA. Entirely film backed, this material is available for licensing in 24p HD, 2k and 4k. For more information visit http://www.PeriscopeFilm.com
