Palm Breweries

The farmyard that would later be called ‘De Hoorn’ was originally documented in the early history of Steenhuffel. In 1380 it was the property of Peter Vander Smessen. In the book of excises of the Duke of Brabant, the property is described as a house with a courtyard located by the churchyard.
Old documents from around the year 1525 mention the name ‘De Hoorn’. At this time, the property was an inn run by Joos De Lichte. However, De Hoorn was reduced to rubble when Steenhuffel saw heavy fighting during the final quarter of the 16th century. Several decades would pass before the Mertens family became the new owners and rebuilt the property. During this period, however, it was not run as an inn. In around 1700, De Hoorn was home to the nobleman Urbaan Lecocq. He sold the property to Andries Van Doorselaer and Joanna Van Accoleyen, who would ultimately begin brewing there.Andries Van Doorselaer and Joanna Van Accoleyen were originally from Malderen, and were also married there in 1691, but they moved their family and their company to neighbouring Steenhuffel. Andries Van Doorselaer started renting a brewery next to the church sometime before 1698; however, he was able to open his own brewery when he purchased the De Hoorn property across the street in 1706. In any case, Andries Van Doorselaer’s entrepreneurial spirit was unstoppable. A description from 1736 indicates that De Hoorn was home to a number of different activities. Chief among these was a farming business, with horses, dairy cattle and grain farming. The inn was also open for business once more – not just for residents of the village, but also for travellers who were able to change horses there. There were also wort boilers and cooling troughs, a still and even a malt oven for germinating the malting barley and drying the locally grown hops.

Author: Dirk Jahn