John Fischer, long-serving and beloved Genesee brewmaster, dies at 75

Fischer, who passed away Saturday morning, worked at the St. Paul Street brewery between 1967 and 2019.

Whether it be on the golf course or inside the Genesee Brewery, John Fischer had the voice, the laugh, and the presence that could fill up any space.

“ARE YOU KIDDING ME???”

That was probably most Fischer’s most spoken phrase. It was often loud and it could be delivered in just about any circumstances. A cry of happiness, sure. A exhortation of distress, absolutely. But you could always count on Fischer to voice that statement with a hearty laugh (or a hearty groan, depending on the circumstances).

Fischer, a larger-than-life figure in local beer and the esteemed former Genesee brewmaster, passed away Saturday morning at the age of 75.

“John was the original brewery guy in Rochester before there were brewery guys in Rochester,” said Mark Minunni, Fischer’s longtime co-worker. “He knew everything about beer and you would love to sit down and have a beer with him. You wanted to be around John. John was the kind of guy who would make you laugh and laugh whenever you were around him.”

Photo: A gathering of Genesee brewmasters: From left, Dean Jones, Matt James, Mike Mueller, John Fischer, and Steve Kaplan.

His friends and colleagues will never forget his warm presence. And local beer drinkers should never forget Fischer’s contribution to the Rochester and national beer scenes. He was instrumental in the development of beers like Genesee Light in 1978 and J.W. Dundee Honey Brown in 1994. Mike Mueller, the corporate brewmaster after Fischer, said Fischer was especially proud of Michael Shea’s Irish Amber, first introduced in 1992.

Fischer, a Rochester native, started as a seasonal employee and worked his way up to brewmaster, a remarkable trajectory over nearly 50 years with the brewery. (He had a three-year stint in the Army and served in Vietnam.) He retired in 2013 and remained with the brewery until 2019 as brewmaster emeritus.

Perhaps his greatest contribution, however, were his Herculean efforts to keep the brewery afloat in the late 1990s as shutdown concerns spread and outside companies circled for a potential takeover. During that time, Fischer was responsible for ordering raw materials. With the brewery being short on funds, he convinced suppliers to let the brewery work on credit. Those developments allowed the brewery to continue making beer at a time when the future hung in the balance.

Fischer later became brewmaster, then corporate brewmaster, in the mid-2000s after former CEO Tom Hubbard and a team of Genny executives completed a purchase of the brewery. But Fischer’s efforts, along with the work on a number of other employees, ensured that the state’s oldest brewery survived.

“The people that stuck around there, like John, are the reason the brewery survived,” Minunni said.

“He was hellbent on the success of that brewery,” added Gary Wergin, another former co-worker. “He did what he could to make it survive.”

“No question, he helped save the brewery,” current brewmaster Matt James concluded. “Without him and a few other substantial individuals, I don’t think we’d be here today. He did a lot of things to help this place survive during our lean years.”

He was later promoted to brewing supervisor in 1978. Fischer completed his brewmaster studies at the legendary Siebel Institute in Chicago. Fischer continued his steady rise through the ranks and was named brewing manager in 1992.

Photo: John Fischer dances as a recent wedding. (Photo provided by Mark Minunni.)

Minunni retired in 2017 as Genny’s brewery manager. He spent 35 years there. So Minunni worked with Fischer for that entire time. But the two grew even closer as golf partners in the Genny golf league over the past seven years. Wergin, Genesee’s former head of quality control, started the league in 1997. It has always provided a way for retirees to stay connected to each other and to the current generation of employees.

As Minunni puts it, the team went from champions three years ago to last place the following two years. Wergin said it was the only title Fischer ever won. And Fischer was named MVP during the championship year and followed it up with LVP honors a year later. During his MVP year, he generated the most points for his team (using the Stableford scoring system), Minunni said.

“For John, every shot he hit was a disaster, even if it was a good one,” Minunni said with a big chuckle. “He would start cussing as soon as the ball left his club. It could’ve gone in the hole, but he’d still be saying, ‘Oh, I’m the worst golfer in the world.’”

Photo: John Fischer (center in black golf shirt) stands among many of his former Genny colleagues.

Wergin, who began at the brewery in 1977, said he played golf with Fischer long before the league started. It didn’t matter the season, they were always on the golf course, Wergin said. He added that they really rose through the ranks together. Wergin retired in 2013. Fischer’s demeanor on the golf course mirrored his demeanor in the brewery, his co-workers said.

Fischer had an uncanny ability to bounce balls out of the water, Wergin joked. He especially enjoyed playing golf in the winter, “because he wouldn’t have to take that penalty,” Wergin added. “We had a lot of fun together. He was a bigger-than-life personality. He was just nice and fun to be around. Good sense of humor. He could take it. He could dish it out.

“I am just crazy about how he went so quickly. I was on the phone with him one minute and the next minute I didn’t have him. I haven’t really gotten over that. I don’t know if I ever will.”

Mueller started at the brewery in 1977, when Fischer worked in the fermentation cellars inside the old Cataract building (which was knocked down to make way for the Genesee Brew House parking lot). Fischer pumped beer from that building to the main brewery and back again.

“He took care of the ale that went to Cataract,” Mueller said. “I was hired on as the P.M. brewmaster. As the brewery expanded and we added the draft center, John became a supervisor there. It was shortly after that he moved up. (Former brewmaster) Clarence (Geminn) brought him into the brewing department. He became a brewhouse supervisor and then he got the opportunity to go to brewing school and the rest is history.”

Mueller called Fischer “the eternal optimist. He was always positive, no matter what the situation. He was just a great guy to know and work with.”

Most importantly, Mueller learned “that there was always a way out of whatever predicament we got into. We just had to find the right way and he always had the right attitude to solve those problems.”

Ask his former colleagues how they would measure Fischer’s legacy and impact and they’d tell you it could be seen in the brewers he mentored like former brewmaster Steve Kaplan and current brewmaster James.

“They all learned from Johnny,” Minunni said. “He brought them along. Johnny never had an ego. It was, ‘I’ll teach you this and then I’ll give you all the credit for this and I don’t want to really be involved in it. It’s all you.’”

“Johnny has a legacy here that no one will ever forget,” said James, who became brewmaster in 2021. “For the majority of my tenure here, he was the brewmaster. Nobody had a more robust character than John Fischer. He was a big, big personality.

“He would talk a big game and be stern and tough, but deep down, he was really pretty soft and a genuinely nice human being. He was funny as hell. He had more Vietnam stories than you could shake a stick at. His life, you could make a movie about it.”

That attitude, however, makes a ton of sense when you consider the history of the Genesee Brewery. People were usually promoted from within after they were empowered to learn and grow. Mueller said he and Fischer learned the ropes from legendary brewmaster Clarence Geminn, the father of Genesee Cream Ale. Geminn’s son Gary, who developed Honey Brown with Fischer, later became brewmaster in the 1990s. Mueller replaced Fischer upon his retirement in 2013.

“Even though we heard his stories over and over again, he was always fun to be around,” Wergin said. “They were still funny. It was just a joy to be around him.”

So it’s easy to conclude, that no, we’re not kidding. And it’s imperative that we raise a glass for John Fischer.