Ringnes

Amund and Ellef Ringnes set up Ringnes & Co with Axel Heiberg in 1876, and Amund brewed the first beer in their own brewery in Christiania, now Oslo, on 28 November 1877. The company says it was the first in Norway to breed its own pure yeast. The founders helped pay for Nansen’s and Sverdrup’s Fram expeditions, and Sverdrup named three islands in the Canadian Arctic after Axel Heiberg and the two brothers. The family ran Ringnes until 1978; after a string of mergers it passed to Carlsberg, the sole owner since 2004. It is Norway’s largest brewer.