April 3, 2009 Friday

Manhattan Beach	Manhattan Beach Brewing Company
6:30 pm to 7:30 pm	The Rat Beach Story

It was 6:30 in the evening and I was in Manhattan Beach at the Manhattan Beach Brewing Company having my favorite, Rat Beach Red Ale, and a plate of fried calamari waiting for the arrival of Kate’s flight at LAX. Parking is a hassle at LA International, so our plan was Kate would call me on my cell phone when she landed and I would drive over to pick her up at baggage claim of Southwest Airlines. Manhattan Beach is only ten minutes from the airport. Good plan, it worked.

I love Rat Beach Red Ale. I first purchased it years ago because it was named after one of the beaches of my youth, Rat Beach, which is an actual place. It’s also excellent ale, thus I order it whenever I can. The Redondo Beach Brewing Company and their sister establishment the Manhattan Beach Brewing Company brew it along with several other excellent beers and ales. Only at these establishments can you purchase Rat Beach Red Ale. They don’t bottle it.

Feeling the urge to show off my wealth of local surf lore, I boldly asked the barkeep, “Do you want to hear the derivation of the name Rat Beach?”

“I have heard a couple,” he replied. “So let’s hear yours.”

“First of all,” I arrogantly proceeded. “Rat Beach is an actual place. It is located at the south end of Torrance Beach where the sand ends and the rocks of Palos Verdes begins.”

“That’s correct,” the barkeep replied. “Keep going.”

“There are two stories,” I continue. “One, in the early sixties at the base of the cliff there use to be considerable amount of trash and piles of dead seaweed, and rats lived there, thus the term Rat Beach.”

“I’ve heard that one,” the barkeep responded. “What’s the other one?”

“Well here’s the real story,” I continued. “In the late fifties and early sixties when the surf craze was first starting, a popular expression was RATSHIT. Anything that was worthless was termed RATSHIT. The term was so common the Kingston Trio cleverly slipped the word RATSHIT into one of their songs. To the surfers, the waves at the end of Torrance Beach where the sand turned to rocks were considered worthless, thus they named this spot, RATSHIT BEACH. The name caught on and a few years later it was shortened to Rat Beach.”

“Well that’s a new one,” the barkeep said. “I have never heard that one before.”

Here’s some more local surf lore. The Brewing Company also brews Dominator Wheat Beer, whose logo is a drawing of a cargo ship run aground on some large rocks. The owners certainly know their history of Palos Verdes. The drawing depicts an actual event that I remember. On March 13, 1961, the Greek freighter S.S. Dominator, carrying 1200 tons of wheat from Portland en route to Algiers, was heading to Long Beach to take on fuel when at 5:30 pm in a dense fog it ran aground on the Rocky Point reef within 100 yards of shore. Rocky Point is the north end of Lunada Bay in Palos Verdes and is the location of some exclusive homes. The rock reef and big winter swells form twenty-foot rideable waves. Despite all their efforts the coast guard and savage companies were unable to pull the boat off the reef. Constant pounding by the winds and high waves drove the 441-foot, 7176-ton ship further up onto the rocks. After two days they gave up, and the crew of thirty abandoned the ship. Forty years of the ocean’s relentless beating, the boat is gone. Nothing remains but a few rusted fragments on shore and metal chunks under water for divers to explore.

I can remember when it happened: fog horns blaring, police car sirens, TV crews scambling and hundreds of people standing on the cliff trying to get a glimpse of the stranded ship. The curiosity lasted for weeks, people came from all over Los Angeles to gaze at the Dominator, parking was impossible, local police had to direct traffic and the local homeowners went nuts due to the mass of people walking over their lawns. The impact lasted for months. The grain got wet, swelled and crack the hull open spilling tons of wheat into the water. The birds loved it and grain fed Lunada Bay lobsters became a delicacy. By September, six months later, the grain was rotting. A smell like decaying grass hung over the entire neighborhood and a billion flies were driving people crazy. Palos Verdes High was a block away and the smell and flies added to the agony of the boring classes. I can vividly remember during a fall heat wave going through two-a-day football practices, fighting the flies and the stench of the decaying wheat.

Now you know why “Dominator” is an appropriate name for a wheat beer. So if you are ever surfing in the South Bay of Los Angeles, stop in either the Redondo or Manhattan Beach Brewing Companies to enjoy a Rat Beach Red ale or Dominator wheat.