As a Professor of Geography at the University of Toledo one of the classes that I teach is called People, Places, and Society. Ostensibly it is an introduction to Human Geography course. During the first few weeks of the semester I spend quite a bit of time introducing the students to basic geographic concepts – things like absolute and relative location, spatial distribution, spatial interaction, spatial diffusion, distance-decay, etc. Of all the basic geographic concepts. absolute location is probably the most straightforward and easiest to understand.

Absolute location is the location that something occupies according to some agreed upon system. One of the most common methods that we use to measure the location of a place is by using lines of latitude and longitude. – think of these as “imaginary” lines drawn on the surface of the Earth.

Lines of latitude (also called parallels) run in an East-West direction. The Equator is 0 degrees latitude. All lines of latitude are numbered between 0 degrees and 90 degrees latitude and are designated as either North or South, depending upon how far they are north or south of the Prime Meridian. The North Pole is 90 degrees North, while the South Pole is 90 degrees South.

Each place on the surface of the Earth can be precisely located according to how far (north or south) they are from the Equator. So for example, New York City, NY is 40 degrees north of the Equator, while Sydney, Australia is 33 degrees south of the Equator. Toledo, OH, where I live, is 41 degrees north of the Equator (just a tad further north than New York City).

Lines of longitude (also called meridians) run in a North-South direction and connect the North and South Pole. All meridians designated as either East or West are numbered between 0 degrees and 180 degrees, depending upon how far they are either east or west of the Prime Meridian. The Prime Meridian. The Prime Meridian is the internationally agreed upon starting point for numbering meridians. It runs through the Royal Observatory at Greenwich in the United Kingdom and is labeled 0 degrees longitude. The meridian on the opposite side of the globe from Prime Meridian is 180 degrees longitude.

Each place on the surface of the Earth can be precisely located according to how far (east or west) they are from the Prime Meridian. The aforementioned New York City, NY is 74 degrees west of the Prime Meridian, while Sydney, Australia is 151 degrees east of the Prime Meridian. Toledo, OH, is 83 degrees west of the Prime Meridian.

So now we have all the information we need to identify the absolute location of these three cities:

• New York City, NY – 40 degrees north, 74 degrees west
• Sydney, Australia – 33 degrees south, 115 degrees east
• Toledo, OH – 41 degrees north, 83 degrees west

The last time that I was teaching this material to my students, I started to wonder about the furthest north, south, east, and west that I had travelled to visit a brewery. So I pulled up a map on my computer screen, and here is what I came up with:

Nya Carnegiebryggeriet (New Carnegie Brewery), Stockholm, Sweden (59 degrees north)

At 59 degrees north, Nya Carnegiebryggeriet (New Carnegie Brewery) in Stockholm, Sweden is the most northerly brewery I have visited. My visit occurred in January 2016. I was in Stockholm attending a conference at the Royal Institute of Technology. Opened in 2014, the brewery is a joint venture between New York’s Brooklyn Brewery and Danish brewing giant Carlsberg.  The brewery is housed in an old 1930s lightbulb factory in the Hammarby Sjöstad district of the city. Hammarby Sjöstad (translated as Hammarby Lake City) is an area of Stockholm that has gained fame as an exemplar of eco-friendly urban redevelopment. The brewery has contributed to the redevelopment of the neighborhood. The brewery’s name, Nya Carnegie, is a nod to Carnegie Porter, a classic Swedish beer. Carnegie Porter traces its origins to 1836 when Scottish businessman David Carnegie Jr. (1813-1890) purchased the Lorent sugar refinery and brewery in the Klippan neighborhood of Gothenburg.

Monteith’s Brewery, Greytown, New Zealand (41 degrees south, 175 degrees east)

At 41 degrees south and 175 degrees east, Montheith’s Brewery in Greymouth, New Zealand qualifies as both the most southerly and the most easterly brewery that I have visited. I traveled to Greymouth on December 2014. I had been in Christchurch, New Zealand attending the annual conference of the Australia-New Zealand Regional Science Association. I had a couple of days after the conference was finished, so decided to visit Greymouth. Christchurch and Greymouth are on opposite coasts of New Zealand’s South Island. With a population of ~8,300, it is the largest town on New Zealand’s west coast. Rather than drive or travel by bus, I decided to take the TranzAlpine train. Identified by Lonely Planet as one of the world’s most amazing train journeys I was keen to take it. I was not disappointed. The 139 mile (223 kilometer) journey, which takes four and a half hours one way took me through the fertile Canterbury Plains and the spectacular southern Alps.

Established during the West Coast Gold Rush of the 1860s, Greymouth, transitioned into a major coal mining and forestry center. Most of the jobs in these two sectors have disappeared and for a number of decades the town has been struggling to revitalize its struggling economy .

After checking into my overnight accommodation I headed for Monteith’s Brewery. I would be one of the 35,000 visitors who visit the brewery annually. Founded in 1868, the brewery was originally family-owned, and is named after the founder Stewart Monteith . In 1970, the brewery became part of Dominion Breweries Group, who were acquited by Heineken in 2013.

It is a brewery with something of a tumultuous history. Two times in past, the owners of the brewery have announced the cessation of brewing operations in Greymouth. The first was in 2001, when closure of the brewery was announced. Such was the public outcry, the brewery was re-opened four days later. The second occasion was in November 2020, when, DB Breweries announced that it would cease brewing operations in Greymouth, citing the uncertainty created by COVID-19 as well as the high cost of transporting raw materials to and the finished product from the brewery. The brewery’s onsite restaurant would remain open. Despite the closure, beer drinkers could still buy Monteith’s beer as it is brewed at two other locations (Auckland and Timaru) in New Zealand. Not surprisingly, the local council were not happy when hearing DB’s plans for the brewery. Indeed Mayor Tania Gibson of asked DB to consider handing over the brewery to the people of Grey District. In January of 2021, DB and the local council reached an agreement whereby the brewery’s bottling plant would be given to the district.

Kona Brewing Company, Hawaii, USA (155 degrees west)

At 155 degrees west, Kona Brewing Company in Kailua Kona on Hawaii’s Big Island is the most westerly brewery I have visited. I visited Kona Brewing in February 2016, while in Hawaii attending the annual conference of the Western Regional Science Association. Kona Brewing Company was founded in 1994. When I visited the brewery in 2016, Kona Brewing Company was a member of the Craft Brew Alliance family of craft breweries. Craft Brew Alliance, established in 2008 with the  merger of Redhook Ale Brewery and Widmer Brothers, acquired Kona Brewing Company from its original owners (Cameron Healy and Spoon Khalsa) in October 2010. In December 2010, AB InBev purchased a 32.2% share of Craft Brew Alliance . In 2020, AB InBev purchased the outstanding 67.8% share of Craft Brew Alliance. In order to not be in violation of Federal Anti-Trust laws, Kona Brewing had to be sold, with the brewery being purchased by PV Brewing Partners, a Delaware limited liability company headquartered in Kansas.

As a brewery, Kona is probably best known for its Big Wave Golden Ale, Longboard Island Lager, and Firerock Pale Ale. You may have seen a number of Kona Brewing’s beers for sale at your local liquor or grocery store. If you live on the mainland, however, the Kona beer that you purchase was not brewed in Hawaii. Partly to save on the costs of transporting beer from Hawaii, Kona beer is brewed  on the mainland United States. I recently enjoyed a bottle of Kona’s Longboard Lager and on the label it indicated that this particular bottle was brewed in one of three locations – Fort Collins, CO, Portland, OR, or Portsmouth, NH. The listing of mainland brewing locations is an outcome of a 2017 class action lawsuit brought against Kona’s then owners, Craft Brew Alliance, for deceiving customers on the mainland into thinking their beer was produced in Hawaii. In 2022, Kona opened a new 30,000-square-foot brewery that can produce 100,000 barrels of beer annually This is ten times the production capacity of the brewery that I visited.

Further Reading

Walton, Sara, Shane Grice and Bevan Catley. 2003. The Monteith’s affair: Bitter to the loyal end. Journal of the Australian and New Zealand Academy of Management, Voulme 9, Issue 2, pages 69-74. DOI: https://doi.org/10.5172/jmo.2003.9.2.69