As legend has it, Calgary’s original microbrewery began one night with a bottle of whisky and an unquenchable thirst for a better local beer. Add a resourceful brewmaster to the picture, and the late Ed McNally had the early beginnings of Big Rock Brewery.

While the city is now dotted with a dizzying variety of beer brewers — pint-sized and otherwise — back in 1984, it took McNally’s bold entrepreneurial spirit to take on the mass producers dominating the suds market.

“Ed McNally was a visionary who wasn’t afraid to forge his own path for something he believed in,” says Big Rock spokesperson Susanne Fox. “He was one of the province’s trail-blazing entrepreneurs.”

Big Rock has developed into one of Alberta’s quintessential success stories over the past three decades. The company has grown its product line, increased its production volume and expanded its operations nearly nationwide.

That success has enabled the craft brewing company to help others realize their untapped potential.

The brewer hands out a host of post-secondary scholarships, but perhaps none more fitting to McNally’s legacy than the Big Rock Brewery Scholarship for Entrepreneurs at Mount Royal University. The scholarship is awarded to a full-time Bachelor of Business Administration student who minors in Innovation and Entrepreneurship.

“The McNally family believes that their success lends to others’ success,” says Fox. “It’s part of the McNally’s DNA and part of the company’s identity.”

For Fox, an alumna of Mount Royal’s Journalism program, her alma mater shares traits with her current employer. During a tour of Big Rock’s southeast facility, Fox pointed to a special collection of barrel-aged beer. Each of the hulking casks was identified by an employee’s name.

“Just like at Mount Royal, everyone here is more than just a number,” she says.

When James Muretich arrived in Calgary, “rock ‘n’ roll came to town.” At least that’s what you’ll hear from some of the city’s music scene veterans, such as artist Tom Bagley, who says the above of his late friend and colleague. Muretich, a charismatic rock journalist, entered the picture sometime in the early ‘80s.

Until then, there was no bona fide entertainment writer in Cowtown. Media outlets, in fact, shunned entertainment writing because it wasn’t considered to be a formal part of the craft. Muretich helped to legitimize the practice. Writing in the pages of the Calgary Sun (the Albertan) from 1979 to 1983 and then the Calgary Herald for two decades, the sharp-witted wordsmith gained a loyal following. He also reached audiences through CJSW-FM alternative radio station and its monthly magazine, VOX, as well as his community access music video show.

“Muretich was more than a voice — he was THE voice,” says Brad Simm, a long-time music magazine publisher, who also works with Mount Royal University journalism students to produce the Calgary Journal. “He was a freight train of verbiage, ideas and energy.”

Muretich was a street reporter who hung out with all walks of life — and partied with them, too.

He paid his own way for shows at every dive bar, motor inn and punk venue in the city to give little-known local acts their first taste of newsprint. Then, he’d turn up to review the big-name bands at the Stampede Corral and the other marquee venues of the day.

“He was totally immersed in the culture,” Simm said. (Muritech) “had a work-hard, party-hard lifestyle.” Sadly, in 2006, he died at the relatively young age of 54 from a brain tumor.

The next year, friends of the rock reviewer established the James Muretich Memorial Bursary, which benefits a full-time Mount Royal Journalism student each year.

Simm believes that Muretich’s willingness to immerse himself into the local music scene serves as a road map to success for the new generation of journalists.

“There are so many opportunities to engage in the DIY culture,” Simm says. “It’s much easier now to pick up a camera and get out there.”