The Rainier Bottling Works: Seattle Beer and Reno's Brewery District on Spokane Street

On a short street beside the railroad tracks in east Reno stands a plain brick building most people drive past without a glance. Its walls went up in 1905 for one purpose: to put Rainier beer into bottles and onto wagons bound for every town in Nevada. For a few years before Prohibition it was the Silver State's busiest beer depot, the Reno outpost of a Seattle brewing empire — and the same brick shell still stands at 310 Spokane Street, in the old Fourth Street brewery district, housing a very different business today.

This is the story of the Rainier Brewing Company's Reno bottling works: why a Seattle brewery planted its Nevada distributing house here, what it promised the town, the fire that nearly killed it before it opened, and how it outlived the beer it was built for.

A Brewery District by the Tracks

East Fourth Street grew up as Reno's working edge, a place of rail sidings, warehouses, and the smell of malt. Reno Brewing Company opened here in 1903 and made the neighborhood a beer town, and within two years the big outside houses wanted in. Rainier chose a lot one block from its new local rival, in the Morrell and Smith addition, where a spur track could run a boxcar of beer right up to a loading platform. That was the whole point of the site: steel rails in, delivery wagons out. For the road this district fronted, and how Fourth Street became Nevada's main street, see our piece on the Lincoln Highway in Reno.

“Every Dollar in Reno”

In the summer of 1905 the plans were announced with real fanfare. The Seattle brewery — the largest west of St. Louis, with an export trade that reached the Orient and the Philippines — would build a bottling house and a brick stable in Reno at a cost of between twenty-five and thirty thousand dollars, the work handed to local contractors. The man in charge was C. W. Kohl, the company's Nevada distributing agent, and he made a point of the town's share in it. “We are going to spend every dollar we can in Reno,” he said: local labor, local material, and about a dozen men on the payroll once the plant opened that November.

The ambition behind it was plain. Reno was to be the distributing point for Rainier across Nevada and the eastern slice of California. Three carloads of beer would be bottled here every week, better than two million quarts a year, and run out to every town in the state behind, as Kohl promised, “a string of the finest wagons to be seen anywhere and the best stock money can buy.” The beer itself was sold on romance as much as taste, brewed, the company liked to say, from the snow waters of Mount Rainier. Kohl framed the move as neighborly rather than predatory. “We come here to get in on the ground floor,” he said, “not to drive any one else out of business, but to get a share of the business.”

Fire in the Cellar

It nearly ended before it began. In October 1905, only days before the plant was to open, a fire broke out in the cellar, almost certainly set. The flames were caught by a watchman from the Reno Brewing Company next door, who raised the alarm just in time to save the new building. The irony was lost on no one: the rival brewery's night man rescued the competition's beer house. The plant opened on schedule, its boilers freighted in from Chicago, and went to work.

Prohibition and the Long Afterlife

The beer did not last; the building did. When Washington State voted itself dry, Rainier moved its brewing to San Francisco in 1915, and national Prohibition finished the job. The Reno works simply changed what it put in the bottles. By 1919 it was turning out near beer — a Rainier product called Becco — along with Brown's Celery Phosphate, carbonated apple juice, and even maple syrup, and renting out cold-storage space to anyone who needed it. The cold rooms that had chilled kegs went on chilling other things for decades: the plant later housed an ice and cold-storage company, and later still an antiques dealer. In 1980 the old bottling works was listed on the National Register of Historic Places.

The Building Today

The brick plant is still there at 310 Spokane Street, a block off Fourth Street and hard by the tracks it was built to serve. The beer wagons and the spur are long gone, and the building now houses the Spice House, a Reno cabaret, a turn its 1905 builders could never have pictured. But the walls are the same walls, raised by Reno hands to bottle Seattle beer, and they remain one of the most intact survivors of the brewery district that once defined this stretch of town. A few doors into that same old Fourth Street world, the neighborhood's taverns kept their own hours; read about one in the Coney Island Bar.

At a Glance: The Rainier Bottling Works

• Rainier's bottling works and Nevada distribution plant was built in 1905 at 310 Spokane Street, in Reno's East Fourth Street brewery district, beside the railroad tracks.
• Seattle's Rainier — the largest brewery west of St. Louis — made Reno its distributing point for Nevada and eastern California, bottling about three carloads of beer a week, more than two million quarts a year.
• The plant cost roughly $25,000 to $30,000, was built by local Reno contractors under distributing agent C. W. Kohl, and employed about a dozen men.
• Days before it opened in October 1905, an arson fire in the cellar was caught just in time by a watchman from the neighboring Reno Brewing Company.
• Prohibition ended the beer: Rainier moved brewing to San Francisco in 1915, and the Reno works switched to near beer (Becco), soft drinks, syrup, and cold storage.
• The building was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1980, still stands, and now houses the Spice House.

Frequently Asked Questions

Where was the Rainier bottling plant in Reno?

At 310 Spokane Street, a block off East Fourth Street by the railroad tracks, in Reno's old brewery district. The brick building still stands.

Was Rainier beer brewed in Reno?

No. It was brewed in Seattle and shipped by rail to Reno, where it was bottled and distributed across Nevada and the eastern part of California. Reno was the distributing point, not the brewery.

What happened to the plant during Prohibition?

Rainier moved its brewing to San Francisco in 1915, and rather than close, the Reno works turned to near beer, soft drinks, syrup, and cold storage.

What is in the building now?

It still stands at 310 Spokane Street and houses the Spice House. The old bottling works was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1980.

Conclusion

The Rainier bottling works is a small monument to a very particular moment: the few years when a Seattle brewery could run a boxcar of beer down to a Reno spur, bottle two million quarts a year, and promise to spend every dollar in town. Prohibition took the beer, but the brick stayed, outlasting the wagons, the near beer, the ice company, and nearly everyone who remembers what it was built for. It is worth a second look the next time you are down on Fourth Street.

We keep a soft spot for the objects this era left behind, and you can meet us in person at the Reno Antique Faire. To bring a piece of old Reno home, explore our curated collection at The Eclection.

Resources & Further Reading

For deeper study, these are reliable, non-commercial starting points:

• Online Nevada Encyclopedia — articles on Nevada history, people, and places.
• Nevada Historical Society — the state museum and research library for Nevada history.
• Reno Historical — a photo-rich map of Reno's historic sites, including the Fourth Street brewery district.

Hero photograph: the Rainier Brewing Company Bottling Plant at 310 Spokane Street, Reno, by JMcFNV, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0.