Schaefer America's Oldest Lager Beer 12 Oz Tab/Stay Top Can

Schaefer Lehigh Valley Stroh Can

The Schaefer America's Oldest Lager Beer 12 oz can produced under the Stroh Brewery Company marks an important chapter of American brewing consolidation. Originally established in New York in 1842 by brothers Maximilian and Frederick Schaefer, the company built its long-standing identity around the heritage of brewing America's earliest continuous lager.

To modernize operations and compete with rapidly growing national brewing giants, Schaefer constructed a large automated brewing and packaging facility in Pennsylvania's Lehigh Valley. In the early 1980s, Detroit-based Stroh acquired Schaefer and took control of the Lehigh Valley facility, using it as a vital hub to supply northeastern and Mid-Atlantic markets.

For breweriana collectors, this can provides physical documentation of the transition from Schaefer's independent heritage to Stroh's ownership. The label artwork retains the familiar red-and-white color palette, heraldic crest, and bold "America's Oldest Lager Beer" script, while the mandatory text identifies Stroh and lists Lehigh Valley, Pennsylvania among its brewing locations.

Side panels from this era reflect late-twentieth-century canning standards, including universal product codes (UPC), metric volume measurements, and multi-city mandatory statements. Known variations exist across different manufacturing runs, featuring slight changes in side-panel city listings, typography placement, and factory seam marks. The Lehigh Valley facility itself went on to become one of the most prolific packaging sites in Pennsylvania brewing history, later operating under subsequent beverage corporations before eventually becoming a production plant for craft brewing.