G. HEILEMAN Brewing Co., which employs 500 people at its Halethorpe plant, intends to rejuvenate National Bohemian beer. Once, National Boh and National Premium accounted for six of every 10 glasses of beer in this region. Now, it's six of every 100.
Following Prohibition, locally made beers with names such as Gunther, Arrow and Free State were king. But the national brewers, aided by television, eventually swamped the local product. Although local brews remain popular in some locales -- Pittsburgh's "Iron City" comes to mind -- home-grown beers in this region went the way of streetside butcher shops and bayside beach resorts.
The local brand that has survived 108 years, if in a withered state, was National Bohemian. Plans by Chicago-based G. Heileman to revive it aren't far-fetched. Just as the good witch told a homesick Dorothy that her ruby slippers could return her home, the company has held the recuperative power all along.
Key to the comeback is Mr. Boh, the one-eyed, mustachioed waiter born to promote the brand in 1936 by Arthur Deute, president of the National Brewing Co., according to retired president Dawson Farber Jr.
Jerold Hoffberger, who ran his family's brewery, believes Mr. Deute and a Gay Street printer named Webb dreamed up Mr. Boh. The character made it onto beer labels, the ballpark scoreboard and animated TV spots.
Jerome DiPaolo, a retired sales exec, recalls customers asking why Mr. Boh had one eye. "It only takes one good eye to tell a good beer," was the retort his crew dreamed up. Company reps would don black, plastic mustaches to hawk the beer to neighborhood pubs. Yet the mascot didn't have a name -- and the company wasn't thrilled the public had come to call him and the brand "Boh". It reminded them of a popular radio soap jingle of the day that warned people against "B.O." Nevertheless, Mr. Boh stuck.
Using the one-eyed logo to repopularize the brand, G. Heileman could tap the twin peaks of regional pride and nostalgia.
When it comes to beer, most of us can't tell "light" from "dry" from "ice." Beer is 95 percent marketing. If we're convinced the product will make us more attractive, athletic and popular, we'll buy it. Mr. Boh could do none of that, but he might enable consumers to return to a time and a place and a world they remember as better -- even if they weren't around then.