Back in the 1970s, Wichita Eagle columnist Jon Roe, seeking to describe someone in a dire situation, said that he was “as desperate as an unattached male at last call on a Saturday night at Kirby’s Beer Store.”  That would of course be the bartender’s dire announcemnt: “Last call, no shit.”

Some Kirby’s Beer Store Survivors, September 2021

I didn’t read Roe’s article when it first appeared, but some friends told me about it not long after because they knew I hung out there a lot.  Located in the northeast part of town, Kirby’s was on 17^th Street, just across from Wichita State University, where I then taught. It was a single, small, square, ill-lit room, with just eight or ten tables with chairs and ten or twelve stools along the bar opposite the entrance.  It served beer with a state-regulated 3.2 percent alcohol content, as opposed to 6.0 for hard liquor bars, where at that time you needed a club membership to purchase booze—although you could bring your own hooch and just order a set-up (tonic water, soda water, 7-Up, whatever) for the cost of a drink anywhere else in the country.  It was not uncommon in those days to see men in tuxedos entering the swank downtown Petroleum Club, escorting elegantly-clad ladies with one hand and holding a brown paper bag that contained a bottle of Scotch or wine in the other.

But at Kirby’s, you only had to be able to push open the front door. In the afternoon, it was a hangout for off-beat WSU graduate students, older undergraduates not long returned from Vietnam, and quite a few WSU teachers—as well as a range of non-academic misfits with some time on their hands. As a sign on the wall said, WE RESERVE THE RIGHT TO SERVE REFUSE.  It was a good place to be if you were comfortable with the implicit conditions. I think never before this very moment have these conditions ever been made explicit, but here goes.  Male or female, you had to like beer. You had to enjoy conversations that ranged from stimulating to mindless (or at least sit quietly and drink your beer if you didn’t). You had to appreciate the hundreds of bizarre, smoke-dyed photos, posters, newspaper clippings, bar napkins, street signs, and trivial artifacts that adorned its dingy walls.  And, at not at all least, you had to be able to tolerate what must have been the foulest men’s restroom outside of the Black Hole of Calcutta.  The ladies room was apparently one small step for mankind higher.

I can’t account for the restrooms, but the alternately languid and spirited wide-ranging conversations as well as the delight in the bizarreness of everyday things were reflections of the fertile mind of the bar’s founder and owner, Jim Kirby, an auto-didact who could chat about lots and lots of things with lots and lots of people, and who enjoyed singularly interesting personalities so long as their behavior did not become confrontational or abusive.  Not hipsters, not beatniks, not hippies, not bikers—they were just a jumble of people who, for better or worse, and in one way or another, were ambling down a less-traveled path.  In every sense, it was a very funny place to hang out—at least in the afternoon.  At night, things tended to get drunker and wilder, with a much different feel. 

But in the light of day, the multi-interested, 30-ish Kirby drew scads of individuals to chat with him and with one another.  The diversity was reflected in the eclectic jukebox, which offered at least one sop to anyone’s taste: Martha and the Vandella’s “Heat Wave,” Linda Ronstadt’s “Midnight at the Oasis,” Glenn Miller’s “In the Mood,” Maria Muldaur’s “Richland Woman” (“if I can make a dress out of a feed sack, I can make a man out of you”), George Harrison’s “Something (in the Way She Moves),” Jessie Colter’s “I’m Not Lisa,” Crystal Gayle’s “Don’t It Make My Brown Eyes Blue,” Vaughan Monroe’s “Ghost Riders in the Sky,” the Bellamy Brother’s “Let Your Love Flow,” Gladys Knight and the Pips’ “I Heard It Through the Grapevine,” Marvin Gaye and Tammi Terrell’s “Ain’t No Mountain High Enough,” and probably the most frequently played, Jimmy Buffett’s “Why Don’t We Get Drunk and Screw?”

There was a student (former, I thought then, but maybe just intermittent) named Greg who would usually drink his beer quietly, but would sometimes offer hair-raising insights from his relentless readings about Germany in particular and World War II in general.  I usually wasn’t interested, and would edge away if he began a rant, especially if his shirt was decorated with Nazi insignias. But one afternoon, with only a few people in the quiet bar, he suddenly began to speak to no one in particular in a clear, reflective, yet authoritative voice.  “I remember as if it were yesterday,” he began out of nowhere.  “Madge and I were just finishing breakfast on the veranda of our cottage in the naval officers quarters at Hickam. Suddenly, just as I was beginning to apply a last spoonful of marmelade to one of Madge’s delicious scones, I heard the faint drone of engines in the western sky.”  He went on in this mode for nearly an hour, describing the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor comprehensively and in vivid,  apparently personal detail, as if he had in fact been a lieutenant commander caught up in the maelstrom of the aerial attack, struggling to grasp the reality, yet drawing on his years of experience to spring into the defense of his country and his fellows.  Seeming to be addressed an audience other than the astonished afternoon slackers who surrounded him, it was by far the most remarkable impromptu narrative I ever heard—funny, sad, exciting, horrifying, clinical, gripping, full of details, but never losing the big picture.  I believe Greg later became a college-level teacher, but I may just be trying to upgrade your opinion of the profession.

On one rare day when the small black-and-white TV was on and tuned to a local news station, an anchor described a fire engine crew’s rescue of a cat from a tree.  Billy, a young, daily customer, sputtered a few colorful obscenities and concluded “What a waste of time.”  “What’s wrong with saving a cat?” said another patron from his barstool.  “They come down when they’re ready,”  said Billy. “Did you ever see a cat skeleton in a tree?” 

Another vociferous disagreement drew to an abrupt close with one of the most remarkable sentences I’ve ever heard:  “Listen, if you can drive a feather through a brick wall, you can shoot a chicken through pane of plexiglass.”  The dispute had begun when somebody reading a copy of the Wichita Eagle noted that the SPCA was suing Boeing to get it to cease its method of testing the effectiveness of new materials and design for cockpit windows.  Boeing’s technique, apparently, was to use an air cannon to propel live chickens at high speed through plexiglass.  Like most arguments at Kirby’s, the issue was not whether the testing was humane, but rather whether the methodology was practical—that is, whether you could actually fracture a thick window with a chicken.  The conclusive comment drew upon a truism among residents of Tornado Alley—the feather through the brick wall.  This was an article of faith that could not be challenged, so, from the perspective of argumentation theory, it was brilliant and irrefutable.

One of my favorites among Kirby’s denizens was Dennis, a county health inspector who would come by not to examine the place, but just to enjoy a draw or two with friends every few weeks.  He was a warm, amiable bear of a guy, and great laugher who told wonderful stories, including an account from his teen years when he had drunkenly crashed his parents car. When they came to his hospital room the next morning, he was so afraid to face the consequences of his transgressions that he pretended to have amesia.  “Do. . .do I know you?” he asked, pitifully—in every sense of the word.  His parents were ever-after opposed to any form of alcohol, and his father would rebuke him for going to Kirby’s.  One afternoon, Dennis brought his father to Kirby’s to convince him of its social acceptability.  So Dennis conducted his dad around the room, making introductions to various college profs.  “Dad, this is Dr. Broadhead in English. . . .this is Dr. Griese in geology. . .this is Dr. Greenburg in psychology. . .” and several others.  Later, as they walked outside to their car, Dennis said “Well, what do you think, Dad?”  His father replied “That’s exactly what I’ve tried to warn you about.”

My parents, too, came the bar one afternoon while on vacation from their home in California.  They sat imperturbably for a while as a steady stream of characters came by to chat with them.  And why not? My dad was always stoic—a listener, not a talker—and my mom was game for any good time.  One of my friends, McDonough, said “Mrs. Broadhead, did you ever spank Glenn?”  “Why, no,” said my mom, “I don’t think we ever did.”  “Well,” said McDonough, “you should‘ve.”

Once the Coors representative dropped in with a then-famous athlete in tow—I think maybe Steve Williams, who had just tied the world record in the 100-meter dash.  On small cards supplied by Coors, he would scrawl “Steve Williams, 9.9.”  I urged Kirby to give him a bar napkin autographed “Jim Kirby, 3.2,” but he wouldn’t.  I’m still disappointed.

Another of my favorite guys in the bar was named Ron.  Among a smoke-filled roomful of people who could hold forth on myriad topics, Ron had a monopoly on the Wichita State University Shocker’s basketball program.  He once drove to Denver to scout a high school player he thought might help the local team.  Of course, he had no authorization to do so, and received no compensation—if, in fact, anyone at WSU ever actually took time to listen to his opinion.  But on game nights, the WSU arena was stuffed to the brim with fans who freely expressed their opinions without being asked and without compensation.  So it was not really out of character one night at Kirby’s when a drunken stranger in the bar started loudly cursing at and banging on a pinball machine he was playing poorly.  “Take it easy, take it easy,” Ron said to the guy, hardly bothering to look back at him.  “It’s just a game.  It’s not basketball.”

Actually, there were two pinball machines at Kirby’s, one across the room from the another.  The one near the bar was a player’s dream.  You could could bang it, shove it, or shake it (within reason), and it still would’t tilt, so you could always win free games from it. If you knew how, you could even catch the ball with one flipper and hold it steady while lining up your next shot. Or, alternatively, you could hold it steady while trying to flirt with one of the girls looking on, as I was doing one night.  Pretty soon, somebody behind me said “Shoot the ball, turkey.”  I puffed up with self-importance and replied, enunciating super-clearly, “That’s Doctor Turkey.”

A surprising number of people continued to call me that the rest of the time I lived in Wichita.  And probably still do.

Oh.  One more thing about that jukebox.  One afternoon, as five or six guys sat lounging at the bar, an emaciated, weirdly-dressed woman with orange-ish hair—one of the regulars—stood in front of the battered Wurlitzer.  She had put in a quarter, and had made two of her three selections, but now was stumped.  “What do you want to hear?” she asked of nobody in particular.  Billy, at the bar, replied with a sentence that even I cannot bring myself to repeat in this public space, but it referred to a sound that, let us say, could only occur during an unusually acrobatic sexual encounter.  The orange-ish woman paused for one beat and said “What number is it?”

Jim Kirby long ago sold the bar and moved on to successful and rewarding work in pubic relations, film-writing, entrepreneurship, and God knows what else his flexible brain has ever thought of doing.  But Kirby’s Beer Store is still on 17^th Street, and, the last time I checked, so is the jukebox.  There have been several owners since Jim, but each new one has insisted that the previous owner leave the place as is, including specifically all the sepia-tinged junk on the walls.  They’re not buying a location, a space, or even a bar.  They want to own Kirby’s Beer Store.

For more about Jim and/or Kirby’s Beer Store, see

                * WEDDINGS: BILLY AND DEBBIE

                * AUTOMOBILES: THE PICKUP (CONTINUED)

Sometime in the 1980s, while we were living in Ames, Iowa, the kids gave me a book for my birthday, though I believe Marlis likely played some part in the selection.  I don’t remember the title, but it was about the 100 best bars in America, two for each state.

From that author’s perspective, a good bar—a bar bar, as he termed it—would be a window-less structure made of concrete blocks, with one thick, padded red door for entering (or possibly leaving).  In the deep murk of the interior, there could be no ferns, no pinball machines, nothing except possibly a fuzzy black-and-white TV.   Basically, it should be a machine for drunks, at least one of whom should be a master at “holding forth”—i.e., delivering long,  rhetorically florid commentaries on matters of little interest to any adult with a brain and at least a minimal experience of life outside of a barroom.

I had been in seven of them.

In my time, I’ve enjoyed quite a few others, too.  Here’s one.

 

GOSH’S IN STEVENS POINT, WISCONSIN

Back in 1972, I visited my friends Neal and Abigail in Stevens Point, WI, for a week or so in late December—the season of the year when the radio would daily announce the amount of time it would take for human flesh to freeze.  In this daunting milieu, I took to spending late afternoons at a bar on the town square called Gosh’s.

Fronting this town square in Stevens Point were at least 10 or possibly 15 bars, lounges, and liquor-enabled restaurants.  Of these, Gosh’s was a classic neighborhood bar.  As you entered, a long wooden counter and back-bar extended more than halfway down the left side of the room, always tended by a gent who looked to be in his 60s.  Only guys sat or stood at the bar.

On the right side of the room were 10 or 15 tables where husband/wife pairs and the occasional female group of friends or relatives sat.  At the back of the room was a pool table surrounded by a ring of small tables and chairs, all set far enough away that you could actually play pool.  A very decent set-up.

At that time, as my friends had warned me, there was a strong town-and-gown antipathy in Stevens Point, whose economy depended almost entirely on the Lullaby Furniture Company.  So my bearded presence at the bar was aggressively ignored as I sipped my bourbon on the rocks.  However, the place had an ancient jukebox stocked with about 8 million really good polkas and schottisches, which naturally drew my musical and ethnomusicological interest, and I played a bunch of the 45 rpm records each day that I went there—which was basically every day for a week or more.

After several visits, I decided I wanted to play some pool, so I walked to the back of the room and put a quarter down on the pool table’s edge to reserve a place. When my turn came, I inexplicably shot better than I ever had in my life (or ever would again, except maybe for one time in another bar), and as I neared victory I started taking a lot of verbal abuse from the very large mid-20s Polish guy whom I was, against all odds, beating.

The guy was getting pretty hot, I felt, making slurred comments and then glaring at me, and he seemed to have the enthusiastic support of several friends.  After a while, however, an older guy walked back from the front of the bar, drew my opponent’s attention with a beckoning finger, waited for the guy to bend his head down to hear him, and said quietly but firmly, “Old Mr. Gosh says to lay off the kapusti.”

The guy immediately backed away from me, but wasn’t happy about it, and stood there muttering. To try to clear the air, I said “Hey, let me buy you a drink.” He deliberated and then said okay if I’d have one with him.  I shouted to the bartender, “Two of whatever he’s having.”

This turned out to be peppermint schnapps.  Yes, “This turned out to be peppermint schnapps.”  There should be room in that sentence somewhere for the F word, at least twice.  Somehow, I managed to chug down the shot like a man, quickly chasing it with a small glass of Point Special beer. After a few more one-ounce slugs of this vile swill (with chasers) and several increasingly hilarious games of pool, which I was careful to lose (by playing at my normal skill level), I paid off my debts, thanked everyone for the games, and then went back to the bar and stood in an open space next to the guy who’d calmed down my opponent.

After a respectful silence, I asked him, “Which person is Old Mr. Gosh?”

“He was here a while, but he left.  That’s his son behind the bar,” he said.

“Ah,” I said, and stood quietly for quite a while, trying not to seem inquisitive.

“What,” I asked him at last, “does kapusti mean?”

He thought a few moments, and then said “Cabbage-head.”

I nodded.

After a few minutes more, I turned to him again and said, more as a statement than a question, “It doesn’t only mean ‘cabbage-head,’ does it.'”

He looked at me for a moment, and finally said “No.”

I took a rest from Gosh’s on Christmas Eve and Christmas Day, but dropped in the day after, found a stool at the long bar, and ordered peppermint schnapps with a Point Special chaser.

The waitress looked at me and said, “Oh, there you are.”  She walked down to a small table-top Christmas tree at the end of the bar, picked up a tiny wrapped present, and brought it back to me.

“From Old Mr. Gosh,” she said.  “He says thanks for the polkas.”

So kapusti is good with me.

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AFTERWORD:  No, I don’t remember what the gift was.  Probably a key holder, or maybe a church key with “Gosh’s” stamped on it.  I’d like to think it was a tiny bottle of peppermint schnapps.

Jack’s Nest was a roadhouse a few miles outside of Farmville, Virginia, which I frequented while teaching composition at Hampden Sydney College.  During one month, the bar buzzed with anticipation about the up-coming Four County Fair, which I was told was a big deal, and I should be sure to go.  Especially, I was told with smiles and knowing nods, I should check out “the hoochie-coochie girls.”

How quaint, I thought.  These simple yet somehow engaging yokels.

Naturally, I did in fact go to the Four County Fair, taking along a cheap camera which I hung on a cord around my neck, so I could send photos to my stylish friends in the world’s most elegant cosmopolitan urban centers.  For example, Wichita, Kansas.

Once at the fairgrounds, I meandered casually among the various amusements—mainly ring-toss and coin-throw games that you might find at the average PTA fund-raiser.  I took lots of pictures of these manifestations of rustic southern pop culture, and especially of the primitive, primary-colors artwork festooning the premises.

Eventually I worked my way to the back end of the fairgrounds, where I found a big tent with a banner announcing “Hoochie-Coochie Girls.”  I had thought that the gang at Jack’s Nest had been kidding me, but there it was.  So I paid and went in, much as an anthropologist might decide to dwell among a newly discovered Amazonian tribe in order to document its primitive ways.

Inside, a very large group of men, many in bib overalls, were standing in front of the stage.  Before long, recorded music started up, and four or five women climbed onstage and began to gyrate to the music in unexpected yet complicated and interesting ways.  Pretty soon, they were doing so nude.

Not burlesque house “nude.”  Not Sally Rand Fan Dance with pasties and g-string and artful feathers nude. Nude nude.  Right then and there, a couple of miles outside of Farmville, Virginia, in 1980—years before coeds going wild at wet T-shirt contests on DVDs, before show-us-your-tits-for-a-string-of-beads, before instant porn on your iPhone, before teenagers parading around malls in thongs—young women were totally naked and gyrating in explicit representations of sexual congress at the Four County Fair.  It was like going to a movie house to see “Meet Me in St. Louis” and they show “Debby Does Dallas.”

Eventually, some of the dancers invited physical participation by a couple of members of the audience.  I choose my words carefully.

At the end of the show, I think it accurate to say “dazed and confused,” I left the hoochie-coochie tent—and within four steps found myself face to face with three of my Hampden-Sydney College students.  Heads nodding, we said hello as we passed one another.

The next morning, when I walked into my 8:00 o’clock class, I was stunned to encounter a roomful of fully awake and widely grinning late-adolescent schoolboys.  Soon, one of them broke the silence by politely asking, “Get any good pictures, Doctor Broadhead?”

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Another of the barmaids at Jack’s Nest was a chatty young woman in her mid-to-late 20s. In contrast with Pernell’s sister-in-law, she was very, very white—freckled, but very pale.   I believe the word “blowsy” was coined on her behalf.  I guess I probably mean “blouse-y,” in the sense of zaftig.

In any case, she was very pleasant, and she and her boyfriend once had me to an early dinner and cards at his dairy farm so I could see how such an operation worked in south-central Virginia.  I think that guy was so strong that he didn’t need gates in his fences.  To get a cow into another pasture, he’d just pick her up and toss her.  Nice folks.

Back at the Nest one afternoon, as I started to leave while she was tending bar, I said with what I thought was a comical melodramatic sigh, “Well, I guess I’ll go try to pull together the tattered shreds of my life.”

 

“Oh,” she said without a trace of guile, “Doin’ your laundry?”