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Munich
Oktoberfest
The Biggest Party in the World
It’s 12 o’clock noon, and the Mayor of Munich, mallet raised in one hand, is ready to perform what some regard as the most important of all his official duties: To deftly tap the first keg on the first day of the annual Munich Oktoberfest. The custom was started in 1950 by the then-Mayor Thomas Wimmer, an expert tap master. His skill at the occasion set a make-or-break standard for all those who would follow in his footsteps as leaders of the City of Munich. Since then, failure to tap the keg with one confident hit is not an option for a Munich public official. After all, if Bavarians can’t trust a fellow with the people’s drink, how can they trust him with the people’s business? How elected officials handle the tap in public, therefore, has become a defining moment in their political careers. The keg-tapping ritual has evolved into a uniquely Bavarian political contest — democracy not by the ballot but by the mallet.
The
first mayoral
pour from the first keg on the first day of the Oktoberfest marks the starting
point of a marathon beer fest that lasts for 16 days each year, attracting
almost six million noisy revelers from all over the globe. With oompah-bands
blaring,
they congregate in 14 huge beer tents — true canvas monsters in which
the revelers down some 6.75 million liters (about 1.75 million U.S. gallons)
of 
beer
and munch on a staggering 450,000 chickens as well as about 440,000 sausages.
They also make short shrift of all the beef provided by an entire herd of
nearly 90 head of oxen.
Only beers from the Munich breweries are being served at the Munich Oktoberfest and the beer consumption at the fest accounts for about 30% of the entire annual beer production of all the Munich breweries combined. The gaudi (which is Bavarian vernacular for “fun”) usually starts around the last week of September and ends after the first week of October. To get the precise dates of the next Oktoberfest, visit http://www.oktoberfest.de/en on the web.
And
This Is How It All Started...
The notion of a
beer fest in October probably started out decidedly informal, sometime in
the late Middle Ages. In those days, Bavarian brewers did not brew during
the hot days of summer. They made all summer beers in late March and
resumed brewing only when the cool days of fall returned, at which point
they had to consume any left-over summer beer quickly
to empty the valuable cooperage for the new season’s
fresh beers. So the original Oktoberfest was probably a casual activity
for the purpose of disposing, advantageously, of any left-over beer that
had made it through the summer.
The
Oktoberfest as a formal, organized affair took place for the first time
on October 12, 1810. On that day, the Bavarian Crown Prince Ludwig—who
later became King
Ludwig I—married
Princess Therese of Saxony-Hildburghausen. To allow the commoners, too,
to partake in the c
eremonies,
the
noble couple decided to organize a wedding party for its subjects on some
grazing land outside the Munich city gates—and some 40,000 happy Bavarians
showed up for the fun. That meadow, incidentally, was then given its current
name of Theresienwiese (Theresa's meadow), in honor of the Crown Princess—and
to this day this meadow is still the site of the annual extravaganza.
Strangely,
the most popular attraction at the first Munich Oktoberfest in 1810 was
horse racing, not beer, because there wasn't any! The lack of beer
notwithstanding, the fest was such a success that Ludwig decided
to repeat the whole show on the anniversary of his nuptials, in subsequent
years, with beer of course. Already in 1814, the German poet Achim von Arnim
reported that the festivities featured an ample array of beer shacks where
the people could get their brew in half-liter, tin-lidded steins. Eventually,
horse racing was dropped from the program, but—foreshadowing a trend—more
and more beer stands were added to keep the crowds in high spirits, and
the festivities were extended to several days. In 1896, the first beer tents
appeared. Today, the celebration that the illustrious couple had so unwittingly
started on that October day in Theresa's once pastoral meadow has, without
a doubt, become the biggest party in the world.
