German American brewer and civic leader, of Washington, D.C.
Christian Heurich (1842-1945), was born in Haina, Germany, and emigrated to Baltimore in 1866 to join his married sister. Later, he traveled to Chicago to work in a brewery and to Kansas, returning to Baltimore in 1868. Heurich worked for breweries there until 1872 when he and partner Paul Ritter leased Schnell's brewery and tavern on 20th Street, N.W., between M and N Street, in Washington, D.C. Within a year, he bought out his partner's interest and married Schnell's widow Amelia. In 1876, he purchased the brewery buildings and two additional lots. The enlarged brewery covered six lots by 1883 and continued to prosper in spite of a fire that year. Amelia died of pneumonia in 1884. The couple had no children. Christian Heurich remarried in 1887 to Mathilde Daetz, the German-born sister of the brewery's secretary-treasurer. Instead of living in the brewery complex, they resided just behind it in a house on 19th Street, N.W. The business was incorporated in 1890 as the Christian Heurich Brewing Company. For the second time, the brewery caught fire in 1893 while the Heurichs were building their new house on New Hampshire Avenue. The house was completed in 1894. They had only lived in it a few months when Mathilde Heurich died on 20 Jan. 1895. In the fall of 1895, Christian Heurich opened a fireproof brewery in the Foggy Bottom area of Washington (now the location of the Kennedy Center). He mourned the loss of his wife for four years before he married Amelia Keyser, the niece of his first wife, in 1899. Their first child, Christian Heurich, Jr., was born in 1901. Their daughter Anna Marguerite came in 1903 but died less than a year later. Anita followed in 1905 and Karla in 1907. The brewery continued to grow and Christian Heurich bought real estate with the profits as he always had. Heurich beer with various labels won many awards in Europe and the U.S. Prohibition in 1918 forced the brewery to close, but it continued to produce ice. The brewery resumed operation in 1933 with the repeal of prohibition. Ice production ended in 1940. The Heurich family went to Europe almost every summer, but when they remained in Washington, they lived at their farm Bellevue in Hyattsville, Md. Christian Heurich bred prize cattle there. Christian Heurich, Jr., married Consuelo Young in 1925 and had three daughters, Consuelo Corinne, Carol, and Constance. In 1951, he married Beverly Jones and they had two sons: Christian III and Gary. Anita married Charles E. Eckles in 1928 and they had three children: Stanley, Geoffrey, and Amelia. Karla married Lt. Charles B. King in 1931. Their children were Jan, Charles Jr., and Donald. Lt. King was killed in France shortly after D-Day in 1944. Karla married Brig. Gen. Eugene L. Harrison in 1946. The brewery continued operating under Christian Heurich during the 1930s and into the 1940s, even though he was over ninety years old. He worked until nine days before his death on 7 Mar. 1945, at the age of 102. Amelia Heurich bequeathed the house to the Columbia Historical Society (now the Historical Society of Washington, D.C.) before her death on 24 Jan. 1956. The Christian Heurich Brewing Company continued to operate until 1956, but the company was not dissolved until 1960. The federal government bought the brewery property in 1961 for the Kennedy Center and the approaches to the Theodore Roosevelt Bridge. That same year, 650 sticks of dynamite failed to destroy the ice house completely. A crane and wrecking ball were needed to finish the job. In 1962, the razing of the main building was equally difficult. Christian Heurich, Jr., died in 1979. His daughter Carol Hoover predeceased him in 1966. Charles E. Eckles died in 1985, his wife Anita in 1986. Although born years after his grandfather's brewery closed, Gary Heurich began the Olde Heurich Brewery in 1985.
From the description of Christian Heurich collection, 1844-2001 (bulk 1866-2001). (Historical Society of Washington, Dc). WorldCat record id: 378304921
