User:Geez-oz/Millers Brewery

=Millers Brewery=

The diversion into hotels and a brewery was a complete change of business interests. British Breweries had bought land at Taverner's Hill, Petersham to commence its beer production, on Friday 8th September 1933. This company was named Brittons Brewery. Robert W. Miller had advanced money to sustain this new business. In early 1937 this brewery firm went into liquidation, and its assets were transferred to Robert W. Miller on Friday 16th July 1937. Robert W. Miller appointed his son, Marcus, to be the manager. On Thursday 3rd September 1942, Robert W. Miller formed a new company, "Millers Brewery Limited", and transferred his brewery interest to that company.

This new company began to acquire hotels and expanded very rapidly. In my research I located 69 hotels that were wholly owned or financially controlled by Millers Brewery Limited. The list is nowhere near complete. The hotels, large and small, were scattered throughout the city, the suburbs, and in important country towns. In addition in order to obtain the patronage of club business, Millers Brewery had strongly assisted financially over 100 clubs.

Miller Brewery limited had as a wholly owned subsidiary, Cooper Nathan Pty. Ltd., (hotel and club suppliers). Miller Brewery Limited was the sole Australian agent for these firms:


 * Peter Dawson Scotch Whisky,
 * Chateau Grande Brandy,
 * D.S.O. Rum Limited.
 * plus several other liquor sellers.

On Monday 3rd July 1967 Miller Brewery Limited sold its brewery at Taverners Hill, Petersham to Tooheys Limited.

Miller’s was one of the few medium scale Sydney brewers in the twentieth century to successfully take on Toohey’s and Tooth & Co. With their brewery located on Parramatta Road at Petersham, Millers operated a number of hotels and brewed beer from 1951 until 1975, when Toohey’s, who had purchased the brewery in 1967, closed it. Some of the brewery buildings still stand on Taverner’s Hill at Petersham, now bright orange and ironically a Miller’s (no relation) storage.

Was not the Miller's Draught brand around until circa 1976? Really dreadful looking label, as I recall, but the beer was OK. Roderick Miller sold some off some pubs, but not all, in 1969 as he wanted to expand his oil tanker business. Brewing was a sideline for him, coal and oil were his biggest interests. The R. W. Miller tanker was ordered but he died in 1971. (Shell took delivery of it, and was for many years the biggest locally flagged ship. I remember the biggest Miller pub on the south side of Tom Ugly's bridge. Apparently that one pub paid for most of the ship.) The Miller pubs got into trouble in 1974 when the Federal anti-monopolies legislation was introduced. All Miller's pubs were sold, and Toohey's closed the Miller's brand about '76, as they no longer had a bunch of pubs contracted to sell only Millers beer. Please check the 1942 date. His son served in the AIF in PNG from 1942 onwards. It's been five years since I've researched but I believe the Miller's branded beer did not appear until around 1952. They dropped the Britton's Invalid Stout about 2yrs after then, and just kept the draught line.203.219.80.24 (talk) 00:41, 16 February 2015 (UTC)