The Boston Beer Company is an American brewing company founded in 1985 by Jim Koch in Boston, Massachusetts, USA. The beers were originally contract brewed by the Pittsburgh Brewing Company, though today, approximately 35% of its beer is produced at the company's Cincinnati brewery. The brand name for the beers is Samuel Adams, after Samuel Adams, a brewer and an American patriot famous for his role in the American Revolution. Interestingly enough, fellow Patriot Paul Revere's portrait appears on the front of each bottle, allegedly due to Samuel Adams' notoriously bad looks. It is the largest American owned brewery.

History
The Samuel Adams brand began with Samuel Adams Boston Lager. The original recipe was developed in 1860 in St. Louis, Missouri by Louis Koch, who sold under the name Louis Koch Lager until Prohibition, and again until the early 1950s.

In 1985, the recipe was reformulated by Louis Koch's great-great grandson, Jim Koch, with the help of Joseph Owades, the man credited with the invention of light beer in the 1970s. That April, the beer was re-introduced as Samuel Adams Boston Lager, at the re-creation of the first battle of the American Revolution on Patriot's Day. Three months later, it was voted best beer in the United States at the Great American Beer Festival, in which 93 national and regional beers competed. The publicity that followed helped the Boston Beer Company's sales grow to 63,000 barrels in 1989. The beer was first put on tap at Doyle's Cafe in Jamaica Plain.

The company's success occurred as the U.S. craft brewery movement was exploding. By 1995, some 600 craft breweries were producing specialty beers in the United States. That year The Boston Beer Company went public, selling shares of Class A Common stock on the New York Stock Exchange under SAM. Despite the appearance of competitors, the firm remained the largest craft brewer in the United States.

The brand was first produced under contract by the Pittsburgh Brewing Company.Today, more than 60% of its beer is produced at its own recently renovated Cincinnati brewery. The Boston Beer Company also has a small R&D brewery located in Boston, Massachusetts, where public tours and beer tastings are offered.