The history of Texas beer showcased in a university library – crazy concept right? Well, not if you go to St. Edward’s. On Jan. 23, Munday Library will host its annual Hillhops event for the fourth year in a row. Students of all ages are welcome to learn more about the Texas craft beer brewing scene, talk with local brewers and even taste some of the beer.
The main events that make up the bubbly experience include a talk about sustainable beer brewing, followed by a panel with LGBTQ+ leaders in the brewing world. Lastly, there will be about an hour left for people to network and taste some of the beer while listening to the Austin Polka Band live.
Not only will breweries table during the event, but other St. Ed’s organizations and departments will be on hand, including the Bill Munday School of Business, The Office of Career and Professional Development, the Kozmetsky Center of Excellence and Students for Sustainability just to name a few.
St. Edward’s University archivist and special collections librarian at Munday Library Travis Williams explained that the reason the university is organizing this event is for students to understand that, a lot of the time, archives are not just a room full of dusty old pieces of paper.
“Archives aren’t always this old stuffy sort of inaccessible vault,” Williams said. “Sometimes we’re capturing history as it’s happening, which is the case with the craft brewing scene.
In regards to why the event is held in the library, Williams said that it is because this is where the university archives are located – something a lot of students are unaware of.
“It was really important for me to have the event in the library to show people that this is a real dynamic community space, and your archive is right here,” Williams said. “It’s not some secret vault that you have to have special permission to access. This is a community space. We do all of this for you. So come on in and enjoy it.”
Not only does this event make St. Edward’s archives special, but what makes it even more special is that St. Ed’s is one of the only archives in Texas that archives beer history.
“Sometimes we’re capturing history as it’s happening, which is the case with the craft brewing scene,” Williams said. “It’s a huge industry. I would make a case that it’s part of the culture here in Austin, here in the state of Texas. We capture that history, and we wanted to celebrate that and show people that it’s a vibrant thing that you can be a part of. It’s a cool thing that St. Ed’s does. We’re one of the only archives in the country that does this kind of work. We’re the only one in Texas that does. So we’re very, very proud of it, and we wanted to share that excitement with other people, and we found it’s been a really wonderful event because it brings in experts in the field.”
You may be wondering why out of all the things, Williams chose beer as a way to engage students. Well, for one, it is a great conversation starter.
“The minute I say, ‘Oh yeah, we have a craft brewing collection,’ everybody says, ‘Wait, what?’ Because it doesn’t quite stick with what a lot of people have in their mind about what an archive is or what an archive does,” Williams said. “It’s one of the things that’s unique to St. Ed’s. So I think that that’s why we choose to celebrate it, because it’s one of the things that makes us stand out.”
Be sure to make some time in your schedule to check out this super cool event and support local Austin breweries as well as breweries from all over Texas. Doors will open at 4:30 p.m. and the event goes until 8 p.m. Drink tickets will be available at the door (21+ of course) for beer sampling.
