Tom Applegate, owner of Mad Bomber brewery talked about his new establishment in Hayden earlier this month. (SR photo: Kathy Plonka)

When you walk into Mad Bomber Brewing, be prepared to share a stool, spiritually speaking. If you order a St. Nicholas Pale, you’re drinking with Staff Sgt. Nick Reid, who was killed by an improvised explosive device in Afghanistan last December. The Fatman India pale ale? That honors Staff Sgt. Kenneth Wade Bennett, who died a month earlier while attempting to defuse a device near Kandahar. He called his EOD (explosive ordnance disposal) team Fatman, after the bomb detonated over Nagasaki during World War II. And the Benjamin, a big imperial IPA, was the favorite of Sgt. Ben Sites, who succumbed to a brain tumor in July 2012. His parents plan to come out from West Virginia when that beer is tapped in a week or two. All were bomb squad buddies of Tom Applegate. The 26-year-old Montana native left the Army in June to launch his Hayden brewery, which opened Nov. 1/Rick Bonino, SR Spokane7. More here.

Question: Do you plan to check out this brewery?