It’s probably safe to say that most people know Thomas Hardy as the English poet and novelist. Literary buffs, in particular, revere him for such classics as Tess of the d’Urbervilles and Far From the Madding Crowd. Beer geeks, however, salute Hardy for an entirely different reason: his namesake beer, Thomas Hardy’s Ale.
Widely regarded as one of the greatest vintage beers ever created, Thomas Hardy’s Ale was originally brewed by the now-defunct English brewery, Eldridge Pope. During a 1968 festival honoring the fortieth anniversary of Hardy’s passing in the brewery’s town of Dorchester, Brewmaster Ray Botting was inspired to create a special beer to commemorate the occasion. The result was a (then) massive barleywine, weighing in at 11.7 percent ABV, amber in color, probably cloyingly sweet at a syrupy 1.025 final gravity, and awash in English hops due to generous dry hopping.
And having designed the beer with aging in mind, the brewery slapped a label on the bottle stating, “This beer will improve if kept lying down at 55°F [13°C] and will last at least 25 years. DO NOT OPEN BEFORE JULY 1969.” Pint-sized bottles were sold for a whopping English pound, a substantial sum of money in 1968.