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Downtown’s Point Park University made waves in spring 2021 with the launch of its Brewing Science Academy, complete with its own test brewery and tours to local breweries, to train future workers and managers in the burgeoning beer industry.
So it makes sense that now schools are trying to teach people how to make spirits as well.
The initial ingredients and production steps are largely the same, notes Dr. Greg Johnson, dean of the university’s School of Natural Sciences, Engineering and Technology, which now includes the new Academy of Distillation Science.
And unlike brewing, people can’t teach each other or themselves at home, “unless they’re doing it illegally,” he jokes.
The first class, Distilling 101, will cover everything distilling legally, from different spirits ingredients to production methods, styles and aging, and will also include a tour of the distillery.
While most of the class time will be on campus, students will also have the opportunity to operate the shiny new equipment at Iron City Distilling, part of the new Pittsburgh Brewing Company sprawl along the Allegheny River in East Deer.
Last fall, while Point Park’s brewing program was working with the new brewery, someone suggested Johnson talk to newly hired head distiller Matt Strickland, who has written two textbooks on distilling as well as teaching experience at Moonshine College in Louisville, Kentucky, and Siebel Institute of Technology in Chicago.
Strickland is currently teaching the Point Park course, and registration is open until June 10. The first class begins June 11 and will meet for three hours on Tuesday and Thursday evenings for 10 weeks, through Aug. 15. The class has a capacity of 16 students and is already half full. Tuition is $2,200, including all materials.
Graduates will gain the qualifications and knowledge they need to be employed by local distilleries such as Iron City, which will soon be releasing its first spirits, or larger start-ups such as Liberty Pole Spirits in North Strabane, Washington County, and the soon-to-open Pomphay Distillery in Somerset, destinations on the map in a region notorious as the breeding ground for the Whiskey Rebellion following the War of Independence.
“It seems to be growing,” said Johnson, who is already teaching a Brewing 101 class this summer with Dr. Connor Murphy. Point Park added a Brewing 201 class last fall, which Johnson said will be offered again in 2025.
These classes allowed them to brew beers that could be sampled at the end of the course. Eight students this summer will work at Abstract Realm and New France, two of the three breweries at the historic Hazelwood Brewery, set to open this month, and at the new Wye Beer Company in Trafford. Wye Beer Company owner Chris Juricich is an alumnus of the school. (Another student, Joe Vickless, is one of the people set to open Local Remedy Brewing in Oakmont.)
Unfortunately, Johnson said, the distillery students probably won’t be able to make their own on-campus distilled spirits. “We’d have to check with our liquor attorney.”
For more information and to register for classes, visit https://www.pointpark.edu/academics/schools/continuingandprofessionalstudies/distilling-science-academy
Bob, a features writer and editor at the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, is currently on strike and serving as interim editor of the Pittsburgh Union-Progress. He can be reached at bbatz@unionprogress.com.
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