Liberti Libation Station gives new definition to ‘canning’

Frank stands at the bar in the basement museum. Photo by Lois Mittino Gray

By Lois Mittino Gray

Longtime Posey County resident Frank Liberti meets me at the door of his home wearing a welcoming smile and a tee shirt that reads, “Beer is proof that God loves us and wants us to be happy,” a quote from Ben Franklin. He’s about to give me a tour of his Posey County Beer Museum, also known as the Liberti Libation Station, located in two rooms in the basement and in the garage of his home on Raintree Circle Drive in Mount Vernon.

Liberti is a cicerone, a trained expert in beer, similar to a wine sommelier. He also calls himself a bierologist or just “someone who really loves the taste of beer.” His obsession with collecting all things beer-themed began in the 1960’s when he bought a six pack of Pabst Blue Ribbon on a college run and found one of the cans was an anomaly. “It was not normal looking, so I saved it. It was so different, missing all the red decoration,” It is now one of the things he likes to show visitors first in his collection of almost 7,000 cans—the one that started it all.

Frank Liberti and his wife, Peggy, moved from New York to Mount Vernon in 1968 to begin his work as a chemist at GE Plastics. He worked there for 35 years and is now age 72 and retired. “When we moved, that’s when I really started collecting. We moved into our house in 1976. I started to finish my basement and decided I would make a place for my cans down there and it just grew from that.”

Liberti uses an Excel spreadsheet program to keep his collection of over 7,000 cans catalogued, although he can walk around and tell you about each one from memory. His museum also contains about 300 can openers, 50 decorated trays, all kinds of glassware and mugs and steins, many lighted signs, tappers and tap handles, and artwork posters. He refurbished an old television cabinet as a display case for his many glass beer pitchers. His collection has some unusual mementos with beer logos, such as a Heineken thumb drive and the little Budweiser race car he loves.

Liberti obtained all the items in his collection in several ways. He likes to walk in the woods and hunt for cans, check out yard sales and flea markets like Traderbakers, and of course, sample all kinds at locations while he and Peggy are traveling. His tour of the Guinness factory in Ireland is a favorite memory, and he has a large collection of Guinness items, as that is his favorite brand. Other favorites in his collection are his huge Heineken collection and his Indiana Craft brewery collection with 340 craft beers from 52 Indiana breweries.

Other friends, knowing of his collections, help in bringing him items for his museum. This ranges from locals, like Don Kleinschmidt, who works the recycling truck and finds unusual cans for him doing pickups. “He drops off his finds for me when he comes for my recycling” Liberti said gratefully. A relative who lives in Malaysia travels a lot and brings him back cans from other Asian countries, so his collection has cans from places like Laos, Macao Bangladesh, Cambodia, Mongolia, and Suriname as well as European countries like Scotland, Belgium, and Hungary. “The best part is that he brings them to me full, so I can sample them.” Frank showed me the little hole on the bottom of his cans that show he tapped into them to drink them.

The international section of the museum is in the garage where every shelf is a different country. He has at least 100 countries represented in his foreign collection of cans and glassware, lighted signs, hats, and other paraphernalia. The basement portion of the museum is divided into two sections. The first room has a cozy bar, three folding tables of displays and other wares, and his computer setup. Hanging from the ceiling is an eye-catching giant fish with hooks dangling from it advertising Miller High Life. On the wall are many trays, including his favorite Stroh’s Girl one. “It’s fun to look at things in here, like that Stroh’s tray, and remember the deals I made to get them. That one was a real steal and that makes it fun.”

The storeroom behind the first room downstairs is what he calls the “collection” room. It has floor to ceiling shelves of the cans all on display lining the walls. The pop top caps are in alphabetical order. Mugs hang from ceiling spiraling on bent coat hangers, so they won’t come loose. The can openers are up on the ceiling in orderly rows.

The assortment of unusual names is amazing: Sweet Baby Jesus and Sweet Baby Java and Sweet Baby Chai, Old Copper Snappy Ale, Tudor Beer, Bud Light Orange, and Miss Frothing Slosh where the foam is on the bottom. Frank explained the woman pictured on the can is Fatima Yechburgh and she became a hero in Pittsburgh as its mascot featured in parades and ads.

Excitement struck one night in the collection room when their daughter, Patti, and friends were upstairs dancing in the living room. Their shaking and hopping made his wall of beer cans come crashing down spilling onto the floor in the basement. “They came running to see the damage after that great noise. We’ll always remember that one,” he recalled with a shake of his head. “We were originally going to make the Beer Museum area into a playroom for the kids. I guess it’s even.”

The beer enthusiast does not make his own beer since he tried it once and thought the yeastiness “smelled up the house.” He noted it costs as much to make as beer in the store. Liberti was instrumental in developing a beer to honor the Mount Vernon Bicentennial with Tin Man Owner Nick Davidson. “We called it Hoop Pole after the folk lore of river men chasing away robbers with their hoop poles. We made two batches. Each batch averaged around 1600 gallons of beer. It actually sold better in Indianapolis than here,” he said showing me the Hoop Pole can.

Liberti invites beer afficionados like himself to visit the museum and give him a call to check it out. “It was a woman who drove me to drinking. I never had the decency to thank her,” Frank quipped, citing the famous WC Fields line, and looking over at a smiling Peggy.