A huge toast to Bob Kauffman, who passed away on Tuesday, April 28. He was 71 years old. Bob was a good friend to all who knew him, and a great homebrewer who worked for the betterment of the AHA and homebrewing.
“If the world had more Bobs, it would be a better place.”
— Denny Conn, AHA Forum Moderator and member of the AHA Community and Education Committee
“…and we would have more better beers.”
— Fred Scheer, homebrewer
“Bob taught me how to all-grain brew. That turned into a 21-year career. He brought a lunch to my house to show me.”
— Jeff Griffith, Twisted Pine Brewing, Boulder, CO
“Bob helped me get started with all-grain brewing and was a force in the homebrew scene.”
— Coby Royer, Boulder, CO
“Bob was a legendary homebrewer, a huge Denver sports fan, and a great friend.”
— Mark Scheitlin, homebrewer
“Bob’s dedication to the craft of brewing was impressive. He was such an important member of the homebrew club. I also remember some great poker games with Bob.”
— Jack Zuzack, homebrewer
“He is a legend.”
— Charlie Papazian, Co-Founder of the American Homebrewers Association
“Bob was a huge influence on me, a fellow Hop Barley and the Alers Club member (my, Charlie, and Jim Homer’s club too), and taught me, when he let me shadow brew at his house one day, that pumps are good ‘so when I’m old I can still brew!’”
— Julia Herz, AHA Executive Director
Early on, when Bob was starting to brew all-grain, he was making a tripel in his kitchen. A hose or something fell off, and the sweet wort ran onto the kitchen floor instead of into the brew kettle. Bob took some clean terry-cloth towels to sop up the wort, then wrung them out into the brew kettle. The beer, “Kitchen Floor Tripel,” was excellent and won an award at a local competition. He made this beer several more times, without the towels or the floor.
He was a member of Hop Barley and the Alers, the Boulder, Colorado homebrew club, since the early 1990s, and served several terms as club president. The club uses a system to share meeting responsibilities that was Bob’s idea.
“He was a great club president, and he made excellent beer, but the best thing he did was to foster the brewing community, and I am very grateful for that.”
— Janis Gross, former National Homebrew Competition Director
He attended most National Homebrewers Conferences, now called Homebrew Con, from at least New Orleans in 1996 until Portland, OR, in 2018. Bob was my co-chair of the 2007 conference in Denver. He and I worked great together with our different skills. In 1999, he was a panelist on homebrew clubs. For many years, he worked on the judging staff for the Great American Beer Festival and the World Beer Cup, becoming a table captain who managed the volunteers for a table of judges and ensured beers were placed in the correct numbered cups.
He served on the AHA Governing Committee, a forerunner of the current AHA Board of Directors, from 2008 to 2013. Crispy Frey, Homebrew Con Committee member, remembers:
“Gentle, deep, and quiet, Bob drew from his experiences, and these guided his input. Bob had little interest in politics or appearances. Rather, he always sided with what good decisions could be made for the common homebrewer. He had a real passion for working on ways to improve resources for homebrewing clubs.”
— Crispy Frey, Homebrew Con Committee member
“Bob always championed what was best for homebrewing (which really is what we all did). He wasn’t a huge talker but always had good insight in the end. He never seemed to want to be the center of attention.”
— Susan Ruud
“I also always remember that whenever I talked to Bob, he seemed to have a sly smile on his face like there was a joke I wasn’t quite in on — a slightly devious twinkle to the eye.”
— Drew Beechum
Bob is survived by his wife, Caroline; daughters Angie and Crystal; and several grandchildren.
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