Landmark Racetrack bar will close its doors
Pub Date: 1/1/2003
By Paul F. Vang
The end is near for the historic Log Cabin Bar in the rural community of Racetrack near Deer Lodge, Montana. It will be the end of an era for the old bar which has long been a community center and gathering place.
For Mary Harrington, who has operated the bar since 1979, it ll be a chance to finally retire, though not without regrets.
The Log Cabin Bar is housed in a building built in 1889 as a railway station. Over the years the building has served as a post office and general store, and, following the end of Prohibition, a country tavern.
It s located just off I-90 about 10 miles southeast of Deer Lodge. Ms. Harrington said the Racetrack community gets its name from a level plain on the bench lands overlooking the Deer Lodge Valley and a place where, in early days, Indians would race their ponies.
The area has a long history. Danielsville, one of Montana s first gold camps, was west of Racetrack in the Flint Creek Mountains.
A dance hall was added on to the building in 1935, built with prison labor. Warden Conley (long time warden of the Montana state prison at Deer Lodge) would assign trusties to work on area ranches or other places as needed, Mary explained.
While it has been many years since the Indians raced ponies in the area, turkey races, until a few years ago, were a popular annual autumn event at the Log Cabin Bar.
Turkey races? you ask. Indeed, and it s a bit more complicated than you might expect.
Mary, who herself often competed in the annual event, explained that the turkeys were either captured wild turkeys or athletic
domesticated turkeys. Contestants would get behind the turkeys at the starting point, a 100-yard course along the road in front of the bar, and would hold a switch that they could wave in back of or on either side of the turkey to encourage them to head straight for the finish line.
If they happened to hit the turkey the "jockey" would be disqualified. In fact, one person, dressed in a sort of turkey costume, was the designated judge with the power to disqualify entrants if, in his lordly judgment, the turkey was being abused.
Following the races, everybody would celebrate with a big turkey barbecue. We d cook the losers, Mary joked.
The turkey races were an annual event for almost 20 years. The event hit a snag one year, however. An area rancher had captured a bunch of wild turkeys and had them penned up in preparation for race day. Then some predators somehow got into the pens and destroyed the turkeys.
That year s race day was cancelled and never started again. Whether races using wild turkeys ever had the blessing of game wardens was a question better left unasked.
The bar has also been the site of many pool tournaments that took place in the dance hall area where two regulation pool tables dominate the floor.
The dance hall room has a band stand and a full wet bar. Over the years the bar and dance hall has been the center for many community benefits, dances, jam sessions, Halloween parties and other events.
Mary also said that the previous owners, Dave and Vermae Percora, also had neighborhood rodeos behind the bar. Neighboring ranchers would bring in stock from their ranch and area youth could have a chance to compete in their own neighborhood.
The Log Cabin Bar has a food license, though Mary said food is served only on special occasions. I ve tried to have a restaurant here, but it never worked out, she said, noting that she d have to install a commercial kitchen, hire a chef, and other obstacles. On special occasions I ll cook at home and bring the food over here.
Joe and Mary Harrington purchased the Log Cabin in 1979. They were both Butte natives, with Joe a long-time employee of the Anaconda Company and Mary an admitting clerk at Butte hospitals. In the late 70s, Joe could see that the end of mining was in sight. We decided to do something different and came out here, Mary recalled.
Sadly, in 1991, Joe was killed in an auto accident, leaving Mary to continue running the bar. What else was I going to do? It was dumped in my lap, Mary recalls of that difficult time. Actually, she notes, I never wanted a bar, but Joe did. So I kept on with it.
Mary remarried in 1993 to Ike Hunter, who stopped in for a late morning cup of coffee and joined our conversation. Ike made it clear that he s not part of the business. I don t have a job. I m not looking for a job. I won't take a job, he exclaimed with a smile, just before going over to check on the wood-burning stove that keeps the Log Cabin cozy in winter.
In 2006, Mary will finally be able to retire. The Rock Creek Cattle Co. is a Deer Lodge area ranch that is developing a multi-million dollar subdivision which will include luxury homes and townhouses as well as a fishing lodge, fitness center and golf course.
While the development has been a topic of considerable controversy in the Deer Lodge area, the Powell County Planning Board approved the plan.
The developers recently finalized an agreement with Mary to purchase the Log Cabin liquor license and move it to a facility now under construction on the ranch. Construction is expected to be complete in several months and at that time Mary will close her long-time Racetrack business.
What will happen to the historic old community center? Mary said she has had discussions with a potential buyer, a Butte resident, who would like to buy the bar and dance hall, as well as Mary s modular home next door to the bar. He said of the bar, This could be my recreation room, Mary says. If the proposed deal goes through, the entire bar memorabilia associated with the business would stay, except things of personal sentimental value.
High on the list of personal items Mary will definitely keep is a miniature re-creation of the old Columbia Gardens of Butte as well as a miniature of the Log Cabin s back bar. That back bar, incidentally, was originally in the historic Midget Bar in Deer Lodge, and was brought to Racetrack in a 1984 remodeling of the facility. Both of these miniatures, which are protected in glass cases, are the work of Wes Barney of Opportunity, Montana. He s done about 30 miniature bars, Mary commented, but he says he won't do any more. He s retired.
Mary has mixed feelings about closing the long-time business. She talks of changes over the years, such as declines in mining and logging that have reduced back-road traffic and impacted her business, as well as changes in laws and regulations that make it more difficult for a country bar to survive. It ll just drive you crazy, Mary says.
While the business is just a couple hundred yards off busy I-90, they don t draw much passing traffic, and local ranchers are the heart of the bar s business. It s a neighborhood place.
Still, she says, noting that she s now age 74, It s a shame to close it, but it s time, and it s time for me to retire. The business has been good to me, but after 27 years it s time to do something else.
It s been a neat old place, she concludes, ...a lot of memories here.
Source: The Montana Tavern Times, Jan., 2005, published monthly by Continental Communications, 125 W. Granite St., Suite 102, Butte, MT 59701.