The Sebewaing Brewing Company was in operation from before 1880 to 1966 under various names and product offerings.  During this time and for a small town, this place was a major contributor to the economy and livelihood for the Village of Sebewaing.  It provided jobs, products that were sold locally and throughout the state, and a sense of community for the small town of Sebewaing, MI.  The pages here are a place to capture the history of this remarkable place through documented evidence, the knowledge of people that were there, and information passed along.

Otto and Florence Thede

This site, 30 years after his passing, is in dedication and remembrance to Otto H. Thede, the last President and General Manager of the Sebewaing Brewing Company.  Other family members that were once employed at the brewery were Florence Thede, William Thede, and John(Jack) Thede.  Mike Thede also did some work as seen in this photograph with Frank Taschner.

For navigation of this website, a great place to start is the menu or link choice of 1880-1933.  This is a return to the early days of Sebewaing and the start of the brewery.  The next menu choice is the period of 1933-1966 that describes the booming times and financial challenges of the 1960’s when many breweries were either bought up by larger companies or forced to closed their doors.  The next major section is to help understand what happened that resulted in the closing of the brewery.

Fascinating materials are available on the right side of the page under “More Information”.  Everything from the ABA company names, documented labels, a detailed timeline, supporting sources, and even the architectural building plans!  This site is likely the most comprehensive source of information on the Sebewaing Brewing Company located in one place that is easily accessible to all that have a computer and the Internet.

Sebewaing Blade Logo

These materials were gathered with help from other people mentioned on the “Appreciation” page.  Also, hundreds of hours of research between home and the Sebewaing Library have been done painstakingly going through the film archives of the Sebewaing Blade and other newspaper and print sources of the time.  Most of the details and facts have been extracted by the local paper.  Thanks to the late Walt Rummel and the preceding owners for all of the work they accomplished.  There is still more research to do for locating information from the 1950’s and between 1870 – 1933.