In 1984, Anchor celebrated its fifth anniversary at its new home by brewing a special wheat beer, believed to be the first wheat beer in America since Prohibition, and now known as Anchor Summer Beer.

In 1989, Anchor's pioneering spirit and reverence for the timeless art of classical brewing led to its Sumerian Beer Project and Ninkasi, a beer made according to a 4000-year-old recipe. Later that same year, the Brewery was rocked but not damaged by the Loma Prieta earthquake, out of which Anchor's "Earthquake Beer" was born.

In 1993, Anchor Brewing became the first brewery in the world with its own in-house distillery. Anchor Distilling, doing for micro-distilling what Anchor Brewing had done for micro-brewing nearly thirty years before, began making rye whiskey as it might have been made by George Washington. And then, in 1997, Anchor Distilling began making its unique pot-distilled gin, Junípero.