Qualla: Pearl Brewing Company

Pearl Brewing Company: Introduction

Fri, 06 Feb 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit User:Brownings, CC BY-SA 3.0. In 1965, the Pearl Brewing Company bought a candy manufacturer called Judson Candies. Pearl never put its name on a single piece of candy, never used Judson in any marketing campaign, and never explained the purchase publicly. The acquisition made zero business sense -- unless you knew that Harry Jersig, the president of Pearl's bitter rival Lone Star Brewing, had gotten his start in the candy business working for Judson. Pearl's executives had bought their enemy's origin story. That kind of petty, brilliant corporate warfare defined over a century of brewing along the San Antonio River, from 1883 until the brewery's doors closed for good in 2001.

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Image: User:Brownings | CC BY-SA 3.0

Pearl Brewing Company: Four Names, One Hill, and a Watchful Eye

Fri, 06 Feb 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Brownings, CC BY-SA 3.0. The brewery that became Pearl started as the J. B. Behloradsky Brewery in 1881, a poorly run private operation that lasted just two years before an investment group bought it out in 1883 and renamed it the San Antonio Brewing Company. Three years later, they reshuffled to the San...

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Image: Brownings | CC BY-SA 3.0

Pearl Brewing Company: Emma Takes the Reins

Fri, 06 Feb 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Brownings, CC BY-SA 3.0. When Otto Koehler died, his wife Emma succeeded him as chief executive -- a remarkable position for a woman in early twentieth-century Texas. Emma proved to be no figurehead. She modernized the original brew house and dramatically increased production capacity by 1916, transformi...

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Image: Brownings | CC BY-SA 3.0

Pearl Brewing Company: Judge Bean's Favorite Beer

Fri, 06 Feb 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Brownings, CC BY-SA 3.0. Pearl's most colorful marketing asset was Judge Roy Bean, the self-proclaimed 'Law West of the Pecos' who ran his courtroom out of a tiny post office and saloon in Langtry, Texas. Bean's favorite -- and reportedly only -- beer was Pearl, and the San Antonio Brewing Association mi...

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Image: Brownings | CC BY-SA 3.0

Pearl Brewing Company: A Brewery Reborn as a Village

Fri, 06 Feb 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Brownings, Public domain. After 118 years of brewing along the San Antonio River, Pearl closed in 2001 when parent company Pabst moved all production to contract brewers. Silver Ventures Inc. acquired the 22-acre property and began transforming it into something its founders never imagined: a mixed-use ur...

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Image: Brownings | Public domain