Two years after her husband’s death, Luverne Kahl is ready to let go of one more piece of him. For over 40 years, “Catfish” John Kahl collected over 3,000 beer cans from all over the world, crammed into a small corner of their home in Pearl River, La.
The cans belong with somebody who appreciates them as he did, Kahl told nola.com. So she’s now put them up for auction.
Catfish John’s collection filled all of the wall space in one room of his house, referred to lovingly as the “beer cave.” A snapshot into the very history of beer itself, cans from across the globe sit alongside those from long-shuttered American breweries.
Beer can collections such as this are not that uncommon. Collecting discarded cans as a hobby was highly popularized in the 1970s, among both adults and children “The industry capitalized on the fad by pumping out specially-designed commemorative cans whose only reason for being was that collectors would snap them up,” according to the Brewery Collectables Club of America.
Kahl reminisced that she would frequently tease her husband for buying yet another “old, rusty can” online, some costing as much as $50. After his death, Kahl gave particularly special cans to John’s children.
The online listing of 2,500 of Catfish John’s cans is available on EstateSales.net. The starting value is $3,000, and the listing will be available Dec. 11.
