OnTap Magazine

ontapmag.co.za | Autumn 2026 | 21 historical women in beer, but very specific to a time and place. It was in fact Teri Fahrendorf, founder of the nonprofit Pink Boots Society, who “voluntold” Tara to write the “definitive history of women in beer.” In her preface to the book, Tara admits she was shocked that no one had yet done this, given that humans consume more beer than any other drink besides water and tea. How was, I wonder, the average American consumer of this ubiquitous beverage still so, sorry to say, ignorant about beer’s ancient history, and how it was women, not men, who brewed for tens of thousands of years? OUTPOURINGS OF GRATITUDE Tara Nurin was born in Annapolis, Maryland. It’s safe to say she’s been fairly itinerant ever since. Growing up, she and her family traveled to Puerto Rico every holiday season, making her a fluent Spanish speaker. She later attended Tufts University in Boston and studied abroad in Paris her junior year. She eventually got a Master's degree in Broadcast Journalism at Northwestern University in Illinois, and spent the subsequent eleven years as a general assignment television, radio, and print journalist, living all over the U.S in the process. In 2005, she stopped doing daily TV news and started to freelance, largely focusing on tourism, dining, and travel, and within those lifestyle themes, shebegan tohoneher beer focus. She became a BJCP-certified judge, and eventually, worked her way into the role of beer and spirits contributor to Forbes. From the beginning, she “kept women at the forefront.” She wrote a regular women- in-beer column for the Ale Street News, founded one of the first educational groups for women interested in beer, volunteered as archivist and historian for the Pink Books Society, and cofounded its Philadelphia chapter. Itmakes sensewhy, after roughly ten years of writing about beer —and women in beer — that Teri would suggest Tara take on the ambitious project of a book on the subject. Five or six years of rigorous research later, A Woman’s Place is in the Brewhouse hit the bookshelves in 2021. What, I am curious, was the response to the book when it came out? “OhmyGod,” Tara starts, taking a breath. “Overwhelming!” she then adds. “I have… [received] just outpourings of gratitude, excuse the cliche, from around the world.” Two types of reactions were consistent and meaningful to her, she explains. The first type was encapsulated in an encounter she’d had just two weeks before we spoke. She was visiting New Orleans and two tipsy, young, female beer professionals approached her on a balcony. What these two women said to her — in tears! — mirrors what many others have expressed: they work in beer, they haven’t for very long, and they didn’t see a place for themselves in it. They were questioning their careers and their futures. And then they read Tara’s book. They realized that they were in fact very much connected to a community, past, present, and future. As a result, many of these women decided to stay in the industry, while for others it provided the nudge they needed to apply for a job they didn’t think they were qualified for — only then to be offered that job. The other meaningful reaction she has experienced has come fromthe female craft brewing pioneers who had been forgotten about, or perhaps never recognized in the first place. But after Tara dug them up and captured their invaluable contributions to the industry, these women reconnected with beer, and sometimes, in even bigger ways. “And that makes me cry!” Tara tells me. A GOOD PROBLEM TO HAVE What has changed, I ask Tara, in the beer conversation over the last five years, or even since she started writing about gender and beer? For one thing, she replies, the sheer number of women actively involved in the industry, at least in the U.S., has grown significantly. “When I first started researching the book in 2015, I felt like I knew, or at least knew of, almost every female in the country in beer who was doing some notable things. Turns out, I was wrong!” Over the course of her research, she had compiled a list of women she wanted to include in her book, but by the time she actually started writing it in the five or so years since, there were so many more. In the end, she had to leave out some of the primary women she had initially included, although she tried to cover them in the acknowledgments. That, she says, was the biggest change over that time period. “It was a good problem to have I guess, but I still feel guilty about leaving some of them out!” The other notable shift in the last handful of years resulted from the impact of the MeToo movement when it intersected with the beer industry, most explosively in the U.S. in May of 2021. Brewmaster Brienne Allan posted a question on her Instagram account, asking about folks’ experiences with sexism in beer. It proved a lightning rod: she proceeded to get flooded with thousands of replies from across the country. This happened literally as Tara’s book headed to the printer. She managed to squeeze in a few paragraphs referencing the start of the avalanche, but none of the subsequent fallout or progress that took place because of it. In the years since, there has been a spike in people coming forward with their stories, and finally, some accountability in the form of a few notable resignations. “And then a gratifying number of groups and initiatives and programs that evolved out of that,” Tara adds. In general, she points out that wellness in the workplace is a topic getting much more needed attention; however, she then says rather pointedly, “To some extent, we in this movement are concerned that the moment ismovingon.”Shementionsawell- known brewery owner who stepped down amidst evidence of abusive behavior, only to then quietly come back when the furor receded — and he hasn’t changed, as far as she is hearing. Yes, sexism is something people aremore open to talking about, and some of the expectations around behavior have changed, “but we still have a long, long way to go.”