The first was based on the name and recipe for Tivoli Beer, which was brewed in Denver in the building of the same name from 1900 until 1969, when the brewery closed after going through an ownership change and enduring a flood and an employee strike. The original Tivoli building, at 10th and Larimer streets, is now the Auraria Campus student union.
The next beer will be based on one brewed by Moritz Sigi, a German immigrant and businessman who opened the Colorado Brewery in 1864 and later became a Denver city councilman; Sigi was killed in a freak accident in 1874, when his carriage overturned at 19th and Wazee streets after dogs spooked the horses that were pulling it.
See also: - A new brewery will pour Denver's Tivoli beer for the first time since 1969 - From the Archives: 1960s-era Denver Beer bottle and case, made in the Tivoli - Dry Dock's award-winning brewer, Bill Eye, will make all German beers at Prost Brewing
"Sigi could have been the Anheuser-Busch of the world if his horse didn't kill him. This will help him live out his legacy," says Corey Marshall, who owns the new Tivoli and has acquired the trademarks to several other historic Denver beer brands.
To help put a twist on the beer and the story, Marshall is asking customers on Facebook what the new beer should be called. "We can't decide between 'Sigi's Mad Horse' and 'Sigi's Wild Horse.' Give us a hand!," he says in the poll.
Whatever it's called, a version of the beer will brewed in a small quantity this week and tested at a brewpub south of Denver; after that, the beer will be brewed in a much larger quantity at Prost Brewing in Denver, where Tivoli makes its beers with the help of Prost head brewer Bill Eye -- who specializes in German-style lagers.
Marshall says Sigi's will be a bock and should be available in Denver sometime in January or February, depending on Prost's brewing schedule.
Over the past year, Marshall and his wife, Debbie, have been acquiring the rights to the biggest beer names and trademarks from Denver's 153-year brewing past. In addition to Tivoli and Sigi's, they own Zang's Neef's and Hi En Brau. Their goal is to brew some or all of these beers using close approximations of the original recipes.
Marshall, who worked for Coors for the past seven years, is a second-generation Colorado native whose grandfather used to begin every morning with a Tivoli beer and two raw eggs with salt on top. He plans to continue making beers based on old names and recipes from the city's past, and hopes to package some of them as well.
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