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German-born Leopold Friedrich Ludwig Schmidt (1846-1914), worked in various occupations during his life, including sailor, carpenter, saloon keeper, and, most successfully, brewer. With a partner, Schmidt purchased a brewery in Butte, MT, erected a new building for it, and renamed it the "Centennial Brewing Company" by 1875. To gain added skill in the brewing process, he returned to Worms, Germany to obtain a master brewer's certificate in 1878. Between 1880-1895, Schmidt became a prominent and prosperous citizen in Butte, becoming active in county and state politics. Due to his background as a builder, he was put on Montana's Capitol Building Commission; in order to advise the state about capitol building design and construction, this commission visited other state capitols--Salem, OR, Carson City, NV, Sacramento, CA, and Olympia, WA--for comparison. While in Olympia, he scouted out a location for a new brewery.

He bought the site of an existing tannery on the Deschutes River in Tumwater, WA, and purchased it for his new Capital Brewery. The area had two great advantages: Tumwater Falls could be harnessed to provide hydroelectric power and an artesian spring was located on the property, providing a clean source of water. The Capital Brewing Company, whose name was changed to the "Olympia Brewing Company" in 1902, was a success from its foundation, producing 4,000 barrels shortly after opening to 100,000 by 1914. Just before 1919, Olympia Beer was shipped throughout the Pacific Northwest and in Asia. (Schmidt became so successful that he maintained other breweries in the state, the Bellingham Bay Brewery and the Port Townsend Brewery.) His original Tumwater plant produced beer until the onset of Prohibition in WA State in 1916. A new, six-story brewhouse was erected in 1906. In 1933, Olympia Brewing reopened in a new facility located nearby to the original. This second brewery operated until 2003.

Olympia Brewing Company in 1902

PCAD id: 17868