Yesterday, we celebrated Beer Can Appreciation Day and we noted that the first cans didn’t have pull-tabs, they had to be opened with a can opener — usually called a “Church Key.” Well, of course that got me to thinking, why call such a device a church key?
Let’s think back many years ago…. many of the best brewers were monks. To protect their aging beers in their monasteries, the monks locked them away in lager cellars, for which only the monks had the keys. These keys were often the same keys used to open and close the church…..
The first “openers” weren’t f for cans, but for bottles. Bottle caps (originally referred to as “crown corks”) were invented in1862, and unlike the twist-off caps today, required a device to pry the cap off the bottle.
The brewing industry seems to have coined the name church key years ago when beer was only dispensed in bottles — most everybody in the brewery carried a bottle opener or “church key.” It was probably referred to as a church key because it looked like the top end of the kind of heavy ornate keys used to lock/unlock church doors. The term was adopted in the industry for all tools used to open beer.
There are other explanations and theories about the name, such as the name being chosen because the key that punctured the can left an opening that resembled the stereotypical gable and roof line of church buildings, but they all seem less plausible than the fact that the first openers resembled a key.
It just may be appropriate that the term church key is associated with beer and religion. The best brewers were monks and we’ve all heard the expression, “Beer is proof that God loves us and wants us to be happy.” Even Martin Luther, the man behind the Protestant Reformation, pretty much claimed that those who drink beer get to go to Heaven — here’s his quote: “Whoever drinks beer, he is quick to sleep; whoever sleeps long, does not sin; whoever does not sin, enters Heaven! Thus, let us drink beer!”
Cheers.
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