Seltzer Man Returns, and the Fizz Flows Again in Brooklyn
By Corey Kilgannon
Ronny the Seltzer Man is back.
The great seltzer drought of Brooklyn is over.
Ronny Beberman, 62, one of the last seltzer deliverymen in the city, fell from his truck on Sept. 15 while making deliveries in Gravesend, sending him to the hospital with multiple fractures and lacerations, and depriving his faithful flock of several hundred steady customers of seltzer.

But last week, Mr. Beberman, in full neck brace and back brace, was back on his route, this time riding shotgun in his truck while a hired helper drove and carried the heavy cases of bubbly water in thick siphon bottles.
“Yes, I’m back and I feel great seeing all my customers getting their seltzer again,” Mr. Beberman said when reached on Thursday morning on his cellphone. “I’m getting congratulations all over – I don’t know if they’re happy that I’m back, or my seltzer.”
Mr. Beberman has been delivering seltzer in Brooklyn with his old, rattling truck for nearly 40 years, and the accident came right in the middle of the Jewish holidays. His fizzy-loving faithful panicked but did not defect to other seltzer deliverymen, of which there are a half-dozen in the city still. (The deliverymen fill up at Gomberg Seltzer Works in Canarsie, Brooklyn, the last remaining seltzer factory in New York City.)
Mr. Beberman hired a man by the name of Singh Foo, 34, of Brooklyn as a driver and assistant. Mr. Foo, who usually drives an oil truck but is currently on vacation, said he was happy to help Mr. Beberman but would never want to deliver seltzer full time.
“This is a tough job,” he said. “It’s tricky climbing to the top of that truck. I could never do this as a living.”
“I could not do it without Ronny riding with me,” he added. “This takes years of knowing each customer and knowing what they want, when they’re home. It’s not an easy job.”
Asked about his name, Mr. Foo said, “Well, I’m half Chinese, half Puerto Rican, but my father’s best friend was named Singh, so he named me that.”