Images(5)

Package, Product

Object number2017.94.8

Manufacturer Container Corporation of America

Retailer Fort Pitt Brewing Company (1906 - 1957)

Date1951-1957

MediumPaperboard; Ink

Credit LineGift of Robert Thomas

DescriptionCollapsible six-pack beer can carrier container. Brown paperboard. Overall rectangular shape with two rectangular compartments divided by central upright panel featuring two handle holes at top center. Exterior sides are red with horizontal white pinstripes. Each exterior side has an off-white hexagonal shape with beer brand printed in black. Underside is white.DimensionsHeight x Width x Length: 5.75 × 6.625 × 8.563 in. (14.6 × 16.8 × 21.8 cm)
MarksEach long side has black and off-white text on the exterior "Fort FP Pitt / beer".

Each short side has black text on the exterior "six 12 oz. cans / Fort Pitt / beer / FORT PITT BREWING CO. PITTSBURGH 15, PA."

Underside has black printed text in one corner "CONTAINER CORPORATION OF AMERICA / U. S. PATENT NO. 2,576,179".
Historical NotesFort Pitt beer can six-pack carrier container. Part of a collection of Fort Pitt Brewing Company artifacts that was collected by donor Robert Thomas to document the time his family ran the company (1930s through the 1950s). The donor’s great uncle, Michael Berardino, became president of Fort Pitt Brewing Company two years after one of the original owners and founder, Samuel Grenet, died suddenly in 1935. Grenet had started the business in 1906 with Herman Hechelman. They built a brewery in the suburb of Sharpsburg, Pennsylvania, survived Prohibition and were set to be the number one brewery in the state when Grenet passed. Berardino began an aggressive sales campaign to turn the company around after lagging sales the year before. The company also bought the Victor Brewing Company of Jeannette, Pennsylvania, but continued to produce their signature Old Shay beer. In the early 1950s due to local strikes and an increase in national brand popularity, Fort Pitt struggled. After Berardino died in 1957, the company stopped brewing at the Sharpsburg plant and expanded into other products and became the newly incorporated Fort Pitt Industries. The rights to the brand were sold to Gunther Brewing of Baltimore. In 2010, the Fort Pitt name was purchased by Mark Dudash who began producing Fort Pitt Ale.

Related person Michael Berardino (died 1957)

Collector Robert M. Thomas

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