Omaha's Brickway Brewery, Distillery Coming to Craft Brew & Sausage Fest

Brickway founder and brewer Zac Triemert

Many of the brewers who will appear at the Aug. 20 Craft Brew & Sausage Fest can be thanked for playing a vital role in the emergence of Nebraska's homegrown brewing market, but Omaha's Brickway Brewery & Distillery holds a special distinction for also plowing the way for bringing distilling back to the state after nearly a century of absence dating back to Prohibition. 
Brewer Zac Triemert wrote a bill to reintroduce distilling to Nebraska himself. 
“Every [state lawmaker] I spoke to said it was a great idea,” Triemert told The Washington Times recently, adding that many legislators even asked him, “Why has no one done this before?” before the bill garnered an easy adoption by Nebraska's unicameral legislature. 
Located at 1116 Jackson St., Brickway was  the fourth brewery in the state and the first in Omaha. Triemert  told the Omaha World Herald that his brewery/distillery's name is derived from the brick that surrounds their location in Omaha's thriving historic Old Market. All of the product goes out the brewery’s brick-surrounded back door of the location to the back alley.
Brickway, formerly Borgata Brewery, has many homages to history. It's interior features no shortage of references to Omaha's pre- and post-Prohibition brewing history. In fact, Triemert attempted to re-create the brew crafted by Omaha’s historic Jetter Brewing Company, which opened in 1887. Though Triemert told The Wold Herald that the Jetter family no longer has the original recipe for their beer, he said he had an idea of what the older beers would have tasted like, so he crafted something that he thought was a pretty close likeness.
Triemert owns the brewery/distillery, but was also a founder at Lucky Bucket (the beers of which will also be featured at the Craft Brew & Sausage Fest) where he was head brewer.
The Craft Brew & Sausage Fest shares many of the same ideals and aspirations as Brickway when it comes to the importance of historic preservation and the of a thriving downtown. The whole purpose of the brew fest is to raise funds for the Liederkranz, one of Grand Island's most important historic landmarks that literally formed the cornerstone of the city's founding and development of its downtown center. 

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