I don’t know if the Onion is incredibly on top of things or just lucky, but Monday a story in The New York Times asked, “Last Call for the Beer Bar?” It began by recounting the demise of Falling Rock Taphouse in Denver. And Tuesday, the Onion came back with “City Of Denver Shuts Down Bar For Operating Without A Brewery.”
The Falling Rock owners announced they would close the place little more than a month after we sat on the patio there to fill out the paperwork (on a phone, of course) to place a bid on the house we now live in. Fans came from far and near to say goodbye. I talked to some of the more local ones about where they would go most often now. Two names I heard more than others were Rino Beer Garden and Finn’s Manor. Finn’s has a shorter tap list — curated, as the kids say — and a cocktail menu. Rino has more than 60-plus taps.
Would both be classified as beer bars?
Pat Baker provided a definition in his “Beer & Bar Atlas” in 1988. His classifications included classic bar, neighborhood bar, beer bar, Irish bar, German bar, English Pub and fern bar. (Yes, neither wine bar nor sports bar.)
He described a beer bar as “a bar whose main claim to fame is a large range of beer. Frequently, the bar sports and attractive beer can collection, or other vestiges of breweriana. Because of the interest in beer, the beers can be well served, but the wide range brings with it the risk of old beer.”
And, because I bet fern bar grabbed your attention, he wrote, “The sobriquet for the trendy hang-outs of yuppies, almost always decorated with hanging plants. While usually a derogatory term, it is not unknown for a fern bar to offer good beer, or to be interesting!”
More from the “Beer & Bar Atlas” Friday and perhaps a bit of reminiscing about Suds Kroge and Dregs Donnigan.