Brown ale breweries, such as Whitbread, introduced a second weaker and cheaper brown ale that was sometimes just a sweetened version of dark Mild. These beers had an original gravity of around 1.037. After World War II, most breweries stopped producing these stronger brown ales, with the exception of some breweries in the northeast of England. The majority had an OG in the range 1.030–1.035, or around 3% ABV, much like Manns Brown Ale today. North American brown ales trace their heritage to American home brewing adaptations of certain northern English beers, and the English influence on American Colonial Ales. English brown
Burton Ale and "needed cellaring for months before serving, and ... it almost certainly had some degree of secondary fermentation going on during that time – sour beers aren’t a new or strictly continental-European thing". At least in London the terms Burton Ale and old ale were interchangeable, but compared to other old ales and barley wines Burton Ale is distinctively dark, sweet and fruity. Old Burton is a strong version of Burton Ale. Allsopp’s Arctic Ale was originally 11.24% ABV. Old Burton was referenced in The Wind in the Willows: "The Rat, meanwhile, was busy examining the label on one of