Page 126 - Demo

126 VauxVaux is perhaps the most recognisable of any Sunderland brand. The brewery%u2019s creation of beer synonymous with Wearside, most notably Double Maxim, the sight of its dray horses delivering beer around the city and its sponsorship of the football club in the 1980s and 1990s seem to have given it a special place in Wearside culture and its closure in 1999 was incredibly controversial.The brewery was founded in Sunderland in 1837 by Cuthbert Vaux. Its first site was on the corner of Matlock Street and Cuthbert Street (where St Mary%u2019s car park is now), and it later moved to Union Street until LNER bought the land to build the train station station. So in 1875 Vaux moved to its site on Gilbridge Avenue, the site it is now synonymous with.It was here that its famous Double Maxim (traditionally drunk out of a half pint glass) was created. Story. Cuthbert%u2019s grandson Earnest Vaux operated a Maxim gun during the Boar War, and Maxim - the country%u2019s first brown ale, 20 years before that one from Newcastle - was created to celebrate his return. Its strength was reduced during the first world war, Aerial photo of the Vaux Brewery c1974. Credit: Sunderland Antiquarian Society