09/06/2026
A NEW B**R. AN OLD CLAYTON NAME. AND YOU CAN TASTE IT SEPTEMBER 12!
There’s a little local history brewing for the America 250 Heritage Festival: Celebrating Clayton’s Story!
Deep River Brewing Company, in partnership with the Clayton Historical Association, has created a limited-run American l***r especially for the festival.
Its name?
GREGORY’S ORDINARY.
And it will be unveiled and available for sale for the first time at the festival on September 12!
The name comes straight from Clayton’s past.
Beginning in 1778, Etheldred Gregory operated an “ordinary”—a colonial-era inn or tavern—in the former Johnston County courthouse at Hinton’s Quarter, near the east end of present-day Front Street. Gregory’s Ordinary operated there until the building burned in 1809.
More than two centuries later, Gregory’s Ordinary is returning to Clayton—this time in a glass!
And there’s another great local connection: Deep River Brewing has operated since 2013 in Clayton’s former Liberty Cotton Mill and is known as Johnston County’s first legal brewery - a fun distinction in a county with a colorful moonshine history!
BE AMONG THE FIRST TO TRY GREGORY’S ORDINARY!
Visit the festival b**r garden—appropriately called “The Ordinary”—from 11 a.m. to 3 p.m.
• Saturday, September 12
• 11 a.m.–3 p.m.
• Clayton Town Square | 100 W. Main Street
• Festival admission is FREE
Come for the history. Stay for the b**r. Raise a glass to 250 years of American history—and a little Clayton history, too!
The America 250 Heritage Festival is sponsored by: Clayton Historical Association Duke Energy HomeTowne Realty and Aila’s Journal by Charles M. Clemmons
