It’s got its share of nicknames: Brew City (OK, I see where that comes from,) Mil-Town (lame, but I get it) and Cream City (huh?)*.

It’s got a lot of beer: Miller Brewing Company, Sprecher Brewing Company, Stonefly Brewery and Lakefront Brewery all call Milwaukee home.

It’s got Arthur “The Fonz” Fonzarelli permanently standing on the RiverWalk (“Aaaayyyyy!”).

Then there are the brewery tours, sausage races at our Major League Baseball games and the memorable recent parade that consisted of hundreds of Harley-Davidson motorcycles riding down Wisconsin Avenue. It sounded like a plague of locusts, lasted for what felt like several hours, blocked traffic and made it impossible to cross the street. And yet, somehow, everybody was mostly OK with this.
Yes, Milwaukee’s a pretty weird place. Some might even call it a pretty tacky place. Whatever you think of a city that celebrates drinking, noisy motorcycles and erects statues of bygone celebrities, Milwaukee is, for many of us, a home away from home for the next few years.

And you know what? It has kind of grown on me. I have to admit, though, there are still some things about this city that I don’t quite understand.

For some reason that I cannot quite figure out, Milwaukeeans really enjoy brewery tours. In an effort to debunk this mystery, I did some serious, scientific research. And by serious, scientific research I mean asking my roommate about the topic.

“It makes it OK to be drunk and try all kinds of beer. It’s kind of expected,” she said. “Plus, you can get a lot of beer for usually a few dollars. What’s not to love? It’s not alcoholism, it’s a sophisticated tour!”

Sophisticated tour, indeed. I figured that was a pretty good explanation, but it made me think.

Why brewery tours? There are plenty of other things that are manufactured here, and everywhere, but as far as I know, people don’t make a habit of visiting, say, the Klement’s sausage plant. And who would want to? Raw meat being ground up and, well, I won’t continue so you can still eat the stuff without gagging. But trust me, it’s not pretty.

So, my new theory, which is probably pretty obvious to most of you, is this: it all comes down to the beer.

I mean, beer is a pretty common element in college students’ lives, and it’s a major source of income for this Brew City of ours. It is everywhere at parties, baseball games, barbecues and probably in your fridge. A quotation so famously attributed to Benjamin Franklin reads, “Beer is proof that God loves us and wants us to be happy,” and while there exists virtually no documentation that Franklin did say those words, the phrase has become the mantra of many.

It is all about the beer. And in Milwaukee, a city that’s flowing with the stuff (sometimes literally, depending upon which Friday-night party you’re at), I guess it’s only natural that beer-lovers would want to see exactly how their brew of choice is made.

* “Cream City” comes from a certain type of brick made from Milwaukee soil that has a light, creamy color. Still, I think it’s a stretch.

Views in this column do not necessarily reflect the views of Marquette University.