Scherbauer, Louis

Louis Scherbauer and Otto Dillier purchased an acre of land in Similkameen City (near Hedley) in order to build a brewery. By January 1906, the new brewery was almost completed (the original (?) Hedley Brewery burned down on July 19,1904). They dissolved their partnership in October 1908 with Scherbauer buying out Otto Dilliers interest in the business.

Sometime between 1908 and 1912, Scherbauer left Hedley to act as the brewer for the Princeton Brewing Company, managed by W. Thomas. The Princeton Brewing Company was a branch of the Nelson Brewing Company which had absorbed the Hedley Brewery around this time.

In September 1914, the Similkameen Star noted that Louis Scherbauer owned “considerable property” in Princeton. He owned the building that housed Frank Willms barbershop (1915) and he was an original bondholder of the B.C. Portand Cement Company.

He appears to have given generously to the community: In July 1915, he donated $25.00 to the Red Cross (instead of the machine gun fund); he was subscribed to the Princeton Patriotic Fund ($2.00 per month) in 1916; he subscribed to the Victory Loan (1918); donated $25.00 to the building of a Catholic chapel in Princeton (1919); and in 1931, donated $5 to the United Church organ fund.

He was the manager of the Princeton Brewery in September 1917 when the brewery began producing “near beer” with an alcohol content of less than 2.5 percent.

In 1927, the Princeton Star reported that despite Mr. Scherbauer’s “able management” the increase in the population of Princeton and area made it “impossible to keep production up with demand.”

He returned from vacation in Vancouver with plans for a new brewery 30 x 90 feet on the site adjoining the old one. The Princeton Star reported on these plans on June 7, 1928.