Published February 11, 2025 | Updated May 15, 2026
Sam Spilker opened a craft brewery in a farming community located in the middle of nowhere. It offered those used to drinking light domestic lagers like Bud and Busch Light a chance to drink their first IPA. Spilker Ales developed a cult-like following afterwards.
A native of Cortland, Spilker intended to be a biologist or chemist when he moved to Fort Collins to study biochemistry at Colorado State University. What he found when he got there was a community that was part of the craft brewing revolution.
That inspired him to combine his science background with a desire to make things, resulting in his own craft brewery. Not particularly familiar with the industry, he learned the ins and outs of brewing by reading as many books as he could get his hands on. To round out his learning, he did a tour of West Coast breweries to get a feel for what to do and, maybe most importantly, what not to do.
To launch the brewery, Spilker saved money by working on a crab processing boat in Alaska before returning home to work on the family farm, in addition to raising pigs and working at a food distribution plant. He quickly discovered that brewing is an expensive endeavor that requires loads of expensive equipment. While he didn’t have that much money, he made up for it in ingenuity by buying scrap dairy equipment from classified ads.
In his hometown of Cortland, Spilker moved the homemade brewing equipment inside an old brick building that had been a grocery store and a bank. He worked day and night turning the building, which had been vacant since the early 1980s, into Spilker Ales. When he wasn’t at his day jobs, he was working at the brewery late into the night. In addition to welding the mish-mash of dairy equipment that allowed him to brew, he turned the old-vault-turned-freezer into a beer cooler and installed drywall and tile.
He opened Spilker Ales in 1996 after the State of Nebraska stopped requiring breweries to serve food and made it legal to bottle and sell kegs. His was the first free-standing craft brewery in the state since prohibition. His goal from the beginning was to create intensely flavored beers, which seemed like a heavy lift in his farming community. His first beer, Monkey Wrench Brown Ale, didn’t sell particularly well, as the brown ale market was oversaturated. From there he pivoted to a favorite from his home brewing days, Hopalleuia (Hopluia), which he referred to as The Gospel of Hops.
Hopluia before and after it was sold to Thunderhead Brewing Company.
Hopluia was an instant hit, and Spilker developed a cult following. It caught on with the local community, including those same farmers who now made the trek to his brewery to get their growler refilled. The hoppiness being too intense for some, he also brewed Cortland Wheat, which became his top seller. The popularity of his beers began to grow as Spilker traveled to craft beer tastings and other events. Before long, his beer was being served in larger cities including Omaha, Lincoln, Kearney, Beatrice, Nebraska City and Wilber.
By 2004, he opted to focus on just Hopluia due to its growing demand and to improve efficiency by brewing a single recipe. To increase output, Spilker completed a multi-year upgrade project that consisted of adding new equipment and enlarging tanks. At this time, he was even selling his beer offsite.
Competition in the IPA market increased by 2015, leading Spilker to brew his first new beer in 11 years, Sonar. The new beer was a cross between a Belgian double pale ale and an India Pale Ale. Each batch was dry hopped with a different variety of hops. Spilker emphasized his reliance on hops; he personally loved the smell and flavor that the process of dry hopping added to beer. He added other varieties including Technique and Apricot Jackpot.
In 2017, he opted to close Spilker rather than continue working in an industry in which taprooms and hospitality service were becoming increasingly important. Even so, the beloved Hopluia lived on after the recipe was sold to Trevor Schaben of Thunderhead Brewing.
This is part of a series in which we explore the history of Omaha’s breweries past and present.
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In case you missed the last post in this series
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Sources
- Omaha World-Herald archives
- Lincoln Journal-Star archives
- https://visitkearney.org/meet-the-brewer-thunderhead/
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