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­Where does the Oktoberfest come from?

The original Bavarian Oktoberfest started out as a horse race on the 12th of October 1810 to celebrate the wedding of Ludwig I. of Bavaria with Therese of Saxe-Hildburghausen. It has since become an internationally known annual event, held in the center of the 1.3 million people city of Munich, the capital of Bavaria.
It takes place every year in September and lasts until the first weekend in October. It was decided to antedate the festival into September for the people to enjoy the usually warmer days.
Just how big is the Oktoberfest nowadays? The maritime provinces are currently home to 1.7 million people. If every man, woman and child in those provinces would visit the Oktoberfest four times consecutively – that’s how many people attended the Oktoberfest 2011: almost 7 million people.
And 7 million people get thirsty! In the 17 days of Oktoberfest 2011 they drank 7.5 million liters of beer – the equivalent to a 15-year production period for Moncton based Pump House brewery!
Of course there is no good party without good food, and the same is true for the Wies’n (pronounced veezn – meaning „meadow“), as locals call the Oktoberfest. The dimensions are just a bit off from a regular party: this year 118 entire oxen ended up in the stomachs of the hungry crowd, together with 53 whole calfs, more than 500’000 chickens, over 40 tons of fish and 220’000 sausages. Plus an uncountable amount of bread rolls („Semmeln“) and pretzels („Brez’n“).
The 14 big beer tents can host more than 100’000 people, the entirety of the population of metropolitan Moncton, at the same time! But of course there are 18 more tents, just a wee bit smaller, which offer another 5’000 seats.
The beer served at the Oktoberfest is especially made for this occassion, and only Munich breweries are allowed to serve their brews at the Wies’n, nobody else. Not even a descendant of Ludwig I., who owns a brewery just 50 km away from Munich! The beer is a „Märzen“ type beer („March-beer“), stronger in gravity and alcohol content (between 5% and 6%).
The name derives from the fact that brewers need to store their beer at cool temperatures, which, in old times, was achieved by putting ice blocks in the beer cellar. As the last ice blocks could be collected in March, this was also the last opportunity to brew beer. The higher alcohol content of the Märzen acted as a natural preservative for the beer, which could thus be kept throughout the summer, until the new brewing season started.