John White: beer man nonpareil

There is only one way to commemorate the memory of a fellow beer-writer - and that is to raise a glass to him in one of his favourite hostelries.

So after John White's funeral in Grimsby I made the short journey to Cleethorpes, in North Lincolnshire, and had a pint in Willy's Bar on the seafront.

That was where I first met John many years ago. He picked me up at the station and took me to Willy's and on to Grimsby, where I opened the local beer festival.

Regular readers will know the names of brewers Claude Arkell and George Bateman, who both died recently. John White will not be so familiar. He was a writer, rather than a brewer, but still left his own indelible mark on beer and pubs.

John died aged just 62. His home in Grimsby was flooded during the recent storms. He lost a lot of material collected on his beer journeys, and two days later he was struck down by a massive heart attack.

Just a few weeks ago I spent time with John, his wife, Joyce, and a party of brewers on a trip to Bamberg in Germany that John had organised. It was one of the finest trips I have known, and meticulously organised. Every brewery we visited - Bamberg has 11 - and every bar we supped in knew we were coming, thanks to John's planning.

Beer trips were John's speciality. He took early retirement from his engineering job in the oil industry and poured his energy into deepening his knowledge of good beer.

He didn't publish articles in newspapers or magazines. He didn't need to: there was plenty of space on his website, www.whitebeertravels.com, for everything he knew about beer.

A vast storehouse of facts and opinions, the website became a blog before the term was invented. John's first love was cask beer and he was an active member of Camra.

But he didn't stop at these shores, becoming a regular visitor to Belgium, Germany and the Netherlands. Aided by his ability to speak the languages of all three countries, he became an expert in their beers and brewing heritage.

As soon as John returned home, he would write about the trip on his website. Wonderfully generous, he encouraged beer-lovers to make use of this free material.

Using knowledge gained from his trips abroad, he began to organise tours which quickly became legendary. Fellow beer-writers would ask me in hushed tones: "Have you been on one of John's trips to Bamberg? You must go - it's amazing."

Shortly before I left to travel to Bamberg, John emailed me to say that I could, of course, download the Bamberg section of his website.

"But that's the short version," he said. "I'll send you the full one."

The next day, the postman delivered a tome as big as one entire volume of the Encyclopedia Britannica. The epitome of every journalist's dream, this treasure contained everything one would ever need to know about Bamberg's beer, breweries, history and architecture: in-depth research, free of charge.

John also organised bespoke beer trips for individuals. I was fortunate enough to accompany him on a visit to two monastic breweries - Chimay in Belgium and La Trappe in the Netherlands - as well as a memorable trip to the small Belgian town of Hoegaarden.

There we met Pierre Celis, founder of Hoegaarden brewery and its "white beer". The brewery was axed by InBev, to the distress of Pierre and his fellow citizens.

I could have made those trips myself, but I

was happy to leave arrangements to

John and rely on his amazing knowledge of train and plane times, as well as good, affordable hotels.

Between brewery visits, there was always time to take in a few bars. "If we go left and then right by the barber's shop, there's a great bar that does a cracking pint of Westmalle Dubbel," he would say.

And he was always right.

Words cannot express how much I shall miss him. All I can do by way of thanks is to make an annual pilgrimage to Cleethorpes for a memorial pint in Willy's Bar.

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