Linfielder Art Larrance, Oregon Brewers Festival co-founder, dies at age 80 on Sunday, May 26, 2024
By KATU-TV Portland with additional info from Wildcatville
PORTLAND
(KATU-TV Portland) — A co-founder of the Oregon Brewers Festival passed away
Sunday morning, May 26, 2024.
Art Larrance
was one of the most influential people behind Oregon’s craft beer movement. He
was 80.
The news of
his passing was shared on social media by the Oregon Brewers Festival.
“I miss you
dad. I will love you always. I know right now you are enjoying a pint or a dram
of whiskey. Or maybe both,” said his son Tim Larrance on Instagram.
Last year,
KATU’s Wesleigh Ogle spoke with Larrance about the Oregon Brewers Festival partnering with the Portland Rose
Festival. "For all of you who like to come and talk and have a
beer, come down and find me ‘cause now I can have a beer with you," said
Larrance.
In January
2023, the Oregon Brewers Festival announced it would not hold its annual event
citing high costs and lower attendance. The new partnership with the Portland Rose Festival was
announced a few months later.
The Brewers
Festival returns this year at City Fair, from June 2 to June 4.
……………….
Art
Larrance-related stories posted at Wildcatville blog:
https://wildcatville.blogspot.com/2018/12/more-than-20-years-ago-linfielder-art.html
=Linfield Baseball 1966 NAIA World Series Champs: Art Larrance has a mitt of Wildcat history
https://wildcatville.blogspot.com/2012/03/1966-baseball-naia-world-series-champs.html
=Linfield Baseball history on display
https://wildcatville.blogspot.com/2014/12/linfield-baseball-history-on-display.html
:::::::::::::::::::::::::::::
ART LARRANCE, Oral History Interview, March 26, 2018, Oregon
State University
(Click on URL, see video)
:::::::::::::::::::::::::::
Cascade Brewing, Beaverton
Oregon
Meet Our Team
ART LARRANCE, Owner
Bio: Art Larrance has been involved in Oregon’s craft beer industry
since its inception and is considered one of the seven founding fathers of the
Oregon craft brewing industry. He co-founded one of the state’s first
microbreweries, Portland Brewing, as well as the Oregon Brewers Festival, which
today is one of the world’s preeminent craft beer festivals. He helped pass
Oregon’s Brewpub law, paving the way for scores of pubs since. And he developed
Cascade Brewing, a pioneer of the Northwest sour beer movement.
Art got involved in the craft beer industry from its earliest onset in Oregon,
homebrewing in a friend’s basement in the late 1970s. He went on to brew
Grant’s Scottish Ales for the Oregon draft market with high school buddy Fred
Bowman in the early 1980s.
Portland’s reputation as Brewvana wouldn’t exist without
brewpubs, and we have a handful of people to thank for that, including Art. He,
along with Fred Bowman, Brian and Mike McMenamin, Fred Eckhardt, Dick Ponzi,
and Kurt and Rob Widmer initiated brewpub legislation in Oregon in 1985, making
it legal for a brewery to sell its beer on premise, an act that had been banned
in Oregon since Prohibition.
In 1986, Art and Fred opened Portland Brewing Co., which quickly
evolved and grew. They sold stock to shareholders, who claimed stools at the
bar.
In 1988, Art was an active partner in organizing the Oregon
Brewers Festival and is now the sole owner of the long-running and beloved
event. The festival has grown from 22 breweries to 84, and from 15,000
attendees to more than 80,000 from all over the world. An economic survey
estimates the Oregon Brewers Festival’s effect on the local economy at more
than $30 million annually.
In 1994, Art left Portland Brewing to pursue another craft beer
adventure. Four years later he opened the Raccoon Lodge & Brew Pub and
Cascade Brewing in Southwest Portland. His goal was to provide a warm and
friendly atmosphere for families to enjoy quality food and craft beer brewed
on-site.
In 2006, Art and brewmaster Ron Gansberg began an aging and
blending program that would lead to countless awards and an entire new style of
beer: the Northwest Sour Ale. The rest, as they say, is history!!
Year Started: 1998
Favorite Beer: The one in my
hand
https://cascadebrewing.com/meet-our-team as of 5/27/2024
::::::::::::::
OBIT FOR ART’S MOTHER, MARJORIE LARRANCE, 1918-2020
https://obits.oregonlive.com/us/obituaries/oregon/name/marjorie-larrance-obituary?id=14291355
