You just can’t keep Paul Bialas and his cameras out of abandoned and crumbling brewery buildings.
A year after his photo book about Pabst came out, he’s back with another one featuring Schlitz, known for — say it with me — “the beer that made Milwaukee famous.”
Like a vulture circling its lunch on the highway below, Bialas has an insatiable fascination with the history of these once-thriving Milwaukee giants and the carcasses left behind when the workers disappeared.
“I love it. Going in there gets me fired up, and few things do that. I wonder if I have just peaked and now I won’t have that feeling again. These two buildings — Pabst and Schlitz abandoned buildings — how do you top that?” he said.
The self-published “Schlitz Brewing Art” is available on Amazon; Bialas’ website, LakeCountryPhoto.com; and at local bookstores, including Best Place gift shop at the old Pabst site, Barnes & Noble, Books & Company and Boswell Book Company.
Just to be clear, Bialas had permission to photograph both brewery sites. It was easier at Schlitz, he said, because light poured in through the skylight atop the seven-story building that housed two brewhouses, two labs and a malt house.