Photo By Sam Robinson

(L-R) Assault victim Matt Ashcraft reacts to guilty pleas with Tony Baracke, a hate crimes expert; Debbie Walters, a victim's advocate; and Commonwealth Attorney Jack Porter.

But there was a good reason for both Jan. 6 when the Boston Beer Co. announced a $6.5 million expansion of its brewing facility at Liberty Street and Central Parkway, where it will produce fully two-thirds of Samuel Adams beers for national distribution. Boston Beer's founder and brewer, Jim Koch, is a native Cincinnatian whose father was a brewmaster, as were several prior generations of his German immigrant family. The beer Koch first brewed in 1984 used a long-abandoned family recipe dating to the Civil War.

In 1996 Koch purchased the brewery, then used by Hudepohl-Schoenling, and built its capacity to 600,000 barrels annually. That will now grow by another 33 percent, requiring an expansion of the 100-person workforce.

"Anheuser-Busch spills more beer than my company brews annually," Koch jokes, calling his product the last remnant of a historic brewing tradition.

The other piece of history he's perpetuated is his beer's namesake: Sam Adams, the mastermind of the Boston Tea Party, was the original American radical, the most extreme advocate for the independence of the American colonies. His pamphlets and other rabble-rousing publications -- the alternative newsweeklies of their day -- launched a strong tradition of American dissent. Now that's a great inspiration for a brewery.

Bigotry on the Street and in the Board Room
Speaker after speaker railed against SORTA Chairman Benjamin Gettler at a Jan. 6 public hearing, criticizing him for calling the Access bus service, for people with disabilities, a "burden." After two hours, Gettler commandeered the lectern to defend himself. "I can't sit here and listen to all these statements about what I said," he said. "I do not consider people with disabilities a burden. The word 'cost' always precedes the word 'burden.' It is a cost burden that should be shared by all, not merely by the bus riders."

Though the angry crowd couldn't prompt Gettler to apologize, his wife did. When Gettler opened the Jan. 11 SORTA board meeting, he said his wife had told him he'd made a mistake. She also told him, "You were never a burden to me, even when you were in a wheelchair." Her point hit home, Gettler said. Then he took her advice and apologized.

"The word 'burden' is an insensitive word," he said. "I will not use it again."

Steven Ard of Newport pleaded guilty in Campbell County Circuit Court last week to the area's most brutal hate crime of 2004. Ard taunted a gay man and his dog the night of June 26, saying, "Come here, faggot! Why don't you and your little faggot dog come here?" Matthew Ashcraft, who is straight, was passing by when the confrontation took place. When Ard sucker punched the first man, Ashcraft jumped on the attacker and pinned him to the ground. After Ashcraft released him, Ard fetched a baseball bat and ran toward Ashcraft, shouting, "You faggots! I'm gonna kill you faggots!"

Struck in the head, Ashcraft sustained a skull fracture, a blood clot on his brain and was left permanently deaf in one ear, with chronic severe headaches. Uninsured, his medical expenses top $29,000. A fund has been set up at US Bank in Newport to help.

Last week Ard pleaded guilty to first degree felony wanton endangerment and second degree felony assault. He faces a maximum 15 years in prison when he's sentenced Feb. 3.