The Mhist says “Cheers!”

What better time than the summer to talk about a nice cold beer or cocktail. That is what the Mhist - Musée d’histoire de Sherbrooke is proposing with its exhibition ‘À la vôtre!’ starting this week and running until Oct. 23, 2022.

At the heart of the exhibition are the social and sociability aspects related to the consumption, production and distribution of alcohol over the past 150 years in the region. In addition to the fun and festive times, the darker sides of alcohol consumption are also presented, through the social movements of abstinence, temperance and prohibition.

“We could have focused the theme solely on the prohibition period, for example. Instead, we opted for a broader portrait, focusing on the social aspect behind the act of consumption. Whether it’s during parties, weddings or different events, historically or even today, we rarely consume alone,” comented David Lacoste, directorgeneral of the Mhist in a press release.

The exhibition À la vôtre! is punctuated by anecdotes that tell us about the medicinal past of alcohol and the role played by the City Council in issuing liquor licenses in the late 19th century.

“For À la vôtre!, advertisements from the 1900s to the 1960s published in local newspapers proved to be a real gold mine! Through these ads, we can recognize the contexts specific to each era, but also determine the products in vogue and the evolution of the targeted clien-teles,” added Marie-ève Gingras, outreach coordinator and designer of this exhibition.

Also, true yesterday and still today, the region is rich in brewery and wine producers. A nod to the Route des vins and Brasseurs des cantons was therefore a natural choice!

The exhibition À la vôtre! is presented from June 22 to Oct. 23, 2022, in the American-biltrite room of the Sherbrooke History Museum. www. mhist.org.

This exhibition is part of the “Beer” Passport put forward by Destination Sherbrooke, which in-cludes a visit to the Mhist, the Broue exhibition presented at the Musée de la nature et des sci-ences de Sherbrooke and a self-guided tour of the Siboire microbrewery.