Walking Man Brewing hands full ownership to longtime partner Tabatha Wiggins

Walking Man Brewing has handed full ownership to Tabatha Wiggins, turning a long-running partnership into a cleaner line of succession at one of the Columbia River Gorge’s signature beer stops. The move shifts control from founder and original brewmaster Bob Craig to the partner who has already spent the past 12 years managing operations, refining the guest experience and steering the business through a changing beer market.

The brewery announced the change on May 12, and the handoff lands in the middle of Walking Man’s 26th year. Founded in 1999 and already making an impact on the Northwest craft beer scene by late 2000, the 17-barrel brewery near the Bridge of the Gods has built its identity on a mix of continuity and evolution. Walking Man says it is the oldest microbrewery in the Columbia River Gorge, and its reputation was cemented early with beers like Walking Man IPA, Cherry Stout and Homo Erectus Imperial IPA, plus two World Beer Cup gold medals in 2006, including one for Walking Man IPA.

What changes now is ownership, not the pub’s core personality. Wiggins has said the guest experience will stay familiar, with the same faces, a dog-friendly beer garden, live music and a warm space for both locals and travelers. That is the heart of the story here: this is not a reset, but a transfer to someone who has already been shaping the brewery’s daily rhythm since she became co-owner in 2014, after transitioning from employee to co-owner when Craig retired.

Craig has described himself as proud of what Walking Man became, and confident about where it is headed. That confidence matters because the brewery’s next chapter will be written in the same room where its old one was built, with the same steady mix of regulars, Gorge visitors and rotating pints that have kept the pub relevant for more than two decades.

To mark the transition, Walking Man is inviting the community to a casual gathering at its downtown Stevenson brewpub, 240 SW 1st St., on Wednesday, May 20, from 4:00 to 7:00 p.m. It is a fitting way to close one chapter and open another: not with a ribbon-cutting for a stranger, but with a handoff inside a place that already knows exactly who it is.