Charles Haefner: Walked Into A Boiling Vat Of Beer
Charles Haefner couldn't get away from it. During the day, he toiled in a Manhattan white-beer brewery. He went home and drank beer all night, pissed it away, and returned in the morning to make more beer. By the time he reached thirty, his body was probably ninety-five percent beer.
But all the beer in the world couldn't fix what ailed (or, pardon the pun, "aled") him. He was far away from his native Deutschland, with only a cup of grog to warm his soul. He sat brooding every night, sipping at the Nectar of the Lumpen.
One frosty day in January, 1866, he paid off all his debts to his landlord, walked across the street to the brewery, and headed for a vat in which beer was brewing. He stepped into the gleaming copper kettle, lowering himself into the stewing mash, which scalded his skin on contact. The troubled Teuton stood implacably within the gurgling brew, displaying the imperturbability peculiar to his lineage. In the face of blistering pain, he neither flapped about nor tried to exit the boiling kettle. Having heard a lung-popping scream, workers ran in Haefner's direction. They pulled him from the vat, but by that time his lower body was pretty much stewed chicken. He died of burns received while being boiled in brewski.
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