Calgary Brewing & Malting Company

Closed 1994. Founder: A. E. Cross. Historical Calgary brewing anchor. Municipal history documents 1892 formation, 1893 first beer, barley promotion and later closure. ROSTERS 2026-09-24: licensed under its own name in the 1962-63 and 1964-65 ALCB rosters, after Canadian Breweries' 1961 purchase, beside a separate 'Dow Brewery (Western) Limited' in Calgary (dow-brewery-western-limited) that surrendered its licence in 1966.

A summary written during research. The sourced facts are in the sections below.

1. 1892
   Founded three months after prohibition lifted

   The North-West Territories Act of 1875 had kept the west dry; the ban was repealed in 1892 and the company was formed three months later, A. E. Cross elected president and his rancher friends financing it. The City of Calgary calls it Alberta's first brewery. The Inglewood district around it became known as Brewery Flats.

2. 1893
   First batch sold

   Calgary Export Lager, under the buffalo-and-horseshoe label, reached the streets a year before Calgary became a city; shipped as far as China and Australia, sold mainly in western Canada. To supply the malthouse the company imported seed barley from Ontario, distributed it to Alberta farmers and guaranteed a price 25% above market, which the City credits with introducing barley growing to Alberta.

3. 1910
   First commercial natural-gas customer in Western Canada

4. 1916
   Prohibition: temperance beer and soft drinks

   Alberta went dry in 1916; beer production was limited and the company turned to temperance beers and soft drinks, which sold well. In the same era it was among the first in the province to offer employees a pension plan and insurance.

5. 1932
   Brewery Gardens begun

   J. B. Cross, the founder's son, began a garden beside the brewery as Depression-era relief work for employees: plantings, fish hatcheries and waterfalls. Part of the lot was later donated to the City and became Inglewood's community pool in 1963.

6. 1961
   Sold to Canadian Breweries

   In February 1961 Canadian Breweries Limited bought all outstanding shares (recorded as an ownership event; the price and terms are still being confirmed).

7. 1969
   Parent company bought by Rothmans

   Canadian Breweries, the owner since 1961, was bought by Rothmans.

8. 1973
   Renamed Carling O'Keefe

   The operation traded as Carling O'Keefe from 1973.

9. 1973
   Under the Carling O'Keefe name

   Canadian Breweries "renamed Carling O'Keefe in 1973"; the plant's "last major renovation" came in 1984. Whether Carling's Red Deer operation, moved to "a new location in the City of Calgary" in 1966, came to this plant: UNKNOWN. (Avenue Calgary's 'purchased by Foster's Brewing of Australia in 1981' is at odds with Elders IXL's 1987 purchase in the corporate record; kept as written.)

10. 1989
    Molson takes over Carling O'Keefe

11. 1992
    Calgary Beer's centennial; then the end

    Molson "relaunched the signature Calgary Beer with its iconic buffalo-head label for the brewery's centennial in 1992 and then decommissioned the site entirely two years later" — 1994. The stated reason, the exact date and the last brew: UNKNOWN.

12. 1994
    Production ceased

    After 102 years. Most of the original buildings remain together on the Inglewood site through the changes of ownership (City of Calgary, 2019).

13. 2009
    A demolition permit, and an outcry

    "In May 2009, the owner applied for a demolition permit for historic buildings 'without the prior knowledge of the surrounding community of Inglewood or the city's heritage authorities'" — "the 1892 Brew House and Ale Cellars, 1903 Storage Cellars, 1905 Brew House, and 1905 Racking Room Storage", all vacant; a Provincial Historic Resource Impact Assessment was ordered in June 2009 (National Trust for Canada).

14. 2022
    The redevelopment vision

    Matco Development's land-use application envisions housing for up to 2,000 people on the brewery lands, several of the 21 structures demolished and others restored (CBC); the plan keeps the "administration building, smokestack, engine room, bottling plant" with 25,000 square feet of ground-floor retail (Avenue Calgary). Built status in 2026 and any HeRMIS listing: UNKNOWN.