Edinburgh Ale: James Ballantine, Dr George William Bell (1813-1889) and David Octavius Hill
The skills involved in producing calotypes were not only of a technical nature. Hill’s sociability, humour and his capacity to gauge the sitters’ characters all played a crucial part in his photography. He is shown here on the right, apparently sharing a drink and a joke with James Ballantine and Dr George Bell. Bell, in the middle, was one of the commissioners of the Poor Law of 1845, which reformed poor relief in Scotland, and author of Day and night in the wynds of Edinburgh[2]. Ballantine was a writer and stained-glass artist, and the son of an Edinburgh brewer. On the table are three glasses of ale. One contemporary account describes a popular Edinburgh ale (Younger’s) as “a potent fluid, which almost glued the lips of the drinker together, and of which few, therefore, could dispatch more than a bottle.”
Possibly the Earliest Photograph of People Drinking Beer
15 February 2014
While working on the Bernard’s Orange Bitters from Edinburgh post, I came across this image above which is possibly the earliest photograph of people drinking beer. It is a salt print showing James Ballantine, George Bell and David Octavius Hill sharing an Edinburgh ale. The photograph dates from circa 1844.
People | Drinking Gallery VII
Presenting the Seventh Gallery of vintage pictures of “People Drinking”. This is a continuation of:
Photographs of People Drinking – Part I
Photographs and Images of People Drinking – Part II
Photographs and Images of People Drinking – Part III
Photographs and Images of People Drinking – Part IV (Brewing)
Photographs and Images of People Drinking – Part V
Photographs and Images of People Drinking – Part VI
Why men drink
Dawson City Gambling
Goofy Singing Pub Scene – University of Buffalo Alma mater
Happy Hour 24 oz beer in Top Hat
Nice, sexy 1940’s photography of Drinking Beer from a Glass Boot. I like the eyes.
A Syrian mercenary drinking beer in the company of his Egyptian wife and child, c. 1350 BC. Photograph: Bettmann/Corbis
Bowery philosophe drinking beer – 1949
On this day in 1923, in Munich, Hitler wanted to take control of the German goverment (with the aid of Alfred Rosenberg and Max Erwin von Scheubner-Richter). Hitler and company planned to kidnap the triumverate of Generalkommissar Gustav von Kahr, General Otto von Lossow (commander of the army in Bavaria), and Colonel Hans Ritter von Seisser (commander of the state police), in a Buergerbräukeller (a beer hall). The event was later named “The Beer Hall Putsch.”
Photograph, c. 1933, illustrating various classic beer glass shapes. Prohibition caused a lack of public knowledge of how to serve alcoholic beverages, an issue addressed in this nationally syndicated photograph.
Alerted by the smell of a broken bottle of liquor, Federal Agents inspect a “lumber truck”. Los Angeles, 1926
Cow shoes used by Moonshiners in the Prohibition days to disguise their footprints, 1922
An 1876 photo showing Christoph Kusterer’s brewery employees celebrating a spring lager release at the company’s building at Michigan Street and Ottawa Avenue in Grand Rapids. – Courtesy Photo | Grand Rapids Public Library
Sean Connery, who first played James Bond from 1962 to 1971, fixes himself a drink
