Australia is paying tribute to Bob Hawke, their longest-serving Labor Party prime minister who died, aged 89, yesterday.

Hawke was known for his charisma and powers of persuasion. He was also widely regarded as a man of the people, due to his focus on trade union issues and legendary status among beer drinkers.

He once drank himself into the record books, and in Australia, that is quite some feat.

Here’s CBS:

He won four terms as prime minister, serving from 1983 to 1991 before being ousted by his own center-left party when the economy soured. Only two other prime ministers served Australia longer, and both were members of the conservative Liberal Party.

…Opposition leader Bill Shorten said Hawke had transformed Australian society and protected the environment, a reference to his government preventing the damming of a wild river in Tasmania state to generate electricity in a major environmental conflict in 1983. “We have lost a favorite son. Bob Hawke loved Australia and Australia loved Bob Hawke,” Shorten said.

Hawke, as mentioned earlier, also really really loved beer. Here he is, in his 80s, downing a cold one:

If that’s me in my 80s I’ll consider myself lucky.

His reputation as a tippler was cemented during his years as a Rhodes scholar at Oxford University in England, where he earned a Guinness world record by downing 2 1/2 pints of beer in 11 seconds.

“This feat was to endear me to some of my fellow Australians more than anything else I ever achieved,” Hawke wrote of the 1955 stunt in his autobiography. In 1980, Hawke publicly swore off alcohol and was elected to Parliament, immediately taking up a high-profile role as the opposition’s spokesman for industrial relations, employment and youth.

His “tippler” reputation has inspired touching beer-themed tributes from Australians following his death:

We just lost one of the greats. Rest In Peace Bob Hawke a great Prime Minister but also a former world record holder. #riphawkie #ValeBobHawke #BeersOutForBob #Auspol pic.twitter.com/hzrqPa2Qpb

— G’day Sportsworld (@gdaysportsworld) May 16, 2019

This one is for Bob:

Celebrating one of the great Australians #riphawkie pic.twitter.com/nE8pGkQRe6

— Miles Glaspole (@milesglaspole) May 16, 2019

You can check out more beer-downing tributes with the hashtag #RIPHawkie on Twitter.

There’s also a great tribute to the “rambunctious rogue who led Australia” over on the BBC.

[source:cbs]