Stegmaier Brewery -- National Register of Historic Places Delaware and Lehigh National Heritage Corridor Travel Itinerary

Entryway to the Stegmaier Brewery
Photograph by Sue Pridemore

Stegmaier Brewery was the largest brewery among numerous breweries in the Wyoming Valley. At one time the firm was one of the largest independent breweries in the United States. Between 1910 and 1913 when American breweries were sending their beers to be judged in European expositions, Stegmaier Beer swept the field by winning eight Gold Medal awards in every major exposition, including those in Brussels, Paris, and Rome. The brewery grew from a five-employee operation in 1857 to a high of 300 employees in 1971, then ceased operations in 1972. The architectural character of the brewery was established by the Romanesque style of the oldest extant building in the complex, the Brew House Building. Constructed in 1894 and designed by architect A. C. Wagner, its Romanesque influenced industrial style was recreated throughout the complex, influencing the late 19th-century industrial appearance of the other buildings constructed by the First World War. When listed in the National Register in 1979, six buildings remained of the original brewery complex. The complex has been recorded by the Historic American Buildings Survey. In 1995, Bowens, a local architecture firm, performed a prospective-use feasibility study, and found the building worthy of renovation. The building was redeveloped into 70,000 square feet of office space, along with a 60,000 square foot addition. By November 1997, Congressman Kanjorski and five Federal agencies had leasing agreements and moved into a beautiful, newly renovated Stegmaier Building.

The Stegmaier Building is located at 7 North Wilkes-Barre Blvd., Wilkes-Barre. The building is now used as government offices, and is not open to the public.

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