The Front Range’s history of brewing and moral reform

By Lyra Elliott Stone

Travis Rupp, who calls himself the “beer archeologist”  is bringing his research from the classroom and his own brewery to the Museum of Boulder tonight, Wednesday, Feb. 4. His presentation will trace Boulder County’s early brewing traditions and the temperance movement that challenged them.

Beer has long been part of Boulder County’s identity. Austrian and German immigrants established some of the region’s earliest breweries in the 1860s and 1870s, embedding beer into daily life along the Front Range. But as brewing traditions took hold, so did opposition. The Chicago-Colorado Colony, which founded Longmont as a temperance community, rejected alcohol as part of its moral vision for a new agricultural society. Tensions between Longmont and neighboring towns grew sharp, reflecting a deeper cultural divide over identity, industry, and reform.

Those early conflicts are the focus of a lecture at the Museum of Boulder titled “Brewing Beer in a Time of Temperance: The Chicago-Colorado Colony and the Battle for Beer in Boulder County”. The talk will take place on Feb. 4, 2026, from 5:30 p.m. to 7:30 p.m. and is led by Travis Rupp, who is an assistant teaching professor of classics at the University of Colorado Boulder (CU) and a self-described beer archeologist. In addition to his academic work, Rupp has worked in craft brewing and has since opened his own research brewery dedicated to recreating ancient and historic beers.

Rupp’s lecture connects local brewing history with broader national movements, including the rise of temperance and the eventual push toward Prohibition. The timeline overlaps with the founding of CU Boulder in 1876, placing debates over alcohol squarely within the era now being commemorated in the Museum’s 150-year university exhibit. Through newspaper accounts, economic shifts, and agricultural realities, Rupp traces how beer production and moral reform collided in shaping early Boulder County.

Beer remains central to Colorado’s culture today, and Rupp argues that its story is one of cycles. The industry has weathered peaks and valleys before. For him, understanding beer’s past helps illuminate its place in the present.

The event takes place tonight at the Museum of Boulder beginning with beer at 5:30 p.m., and the lecture runs from 6 to 7:30 p.m. Tickets and more info here.

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