Horning named MTA Durkee Award winner
Pub Date: 10/1/2008
By Paul F. Vang
Phil Horning, a long-time operator of the historic Minneapolis House in Great Falls and a leader and innovator in local and state tavern associations, is this year s winner of the Durkee Award, the Montana Tavern Association s highest honor.
The Durkee Award was established in memory of Bob and Marie Durkee, longtime executive directors of the Montana Tavern Association.
Horning talked to Montana Tavern Times after receiving the award at the MTA Convention banquet in Great Falls Sept. 10, and spoke with pride of his family s history in one of Great Falls most historic businesses, the Minneapolis House.
The business was established in 1886, back when Great Falls, after the coming of the Great Northern Railroad, was beginning to take root along the Missouri River.
There were lots of people coming from the Midwest on the new railroad and many businesses tried to attract customers with some familiar names. We had the Minneapolis House, the Milwaukee House, and Minnesota House, among others, Phil said.
Phil s grandfather, Charlie Horning, took over the Minneapolis House in 1905, and through three generations, the Horning family operated the business through several wars, Prohibition and the Depression, functioning as not only a bar, but a hotel and livery stable, eventually earning credit as being the oldest business in Great Falls operating at its original location.
The Minneapolis House, or Minnie House, as it was often called, was both business and home to the Horning family, though there were some mixed thoughts about being in the bar business.
My grandmother, even though she lived in the family apartment above the bar, never approved of alcohol," Phil said. "Some advice I remember getting from my grandfather was, Always remember, liquor is not to be drunk'; it s to be sold.
Nevertheless, the family kept with the business. They survived Prohibition as a rooming house and livery stable. The founding grandparents had three sons, Paul, Clarence ( Duke ), and Carl, who gradually worked their way into the family business, taking it over in the 1930s. Phil was born in 1933 and grew up working at least part-time in the business.
After doing other work, including a stint on the Great Northern Railroad, and working at a restaurant in Black Eagle owned by his future father-in-law, Jasper (Jack) Richardson, Phil, along with a brother, Tom, and sister, Shirley, eventually worked into full-time jobs at the Minnie House, and after establishing a small corporation, took over the business in 1974.
In 1995, Phil elected to retire and sold the business to last year s Durkee Award winners, Tom and Mary Jane Heisler.
While the Heislers later closed the Minnie House, the ornate back bar and walk-in cooler from the historic bar was saved and moved to the Heisler s new facility, Classic 50s.
Through his working years, Phil was always active in the Cascade County Tavern Association (CCTA), and served as the CCTA representative to the Montana Tavern Association Board of Directors.
As an MTA officer, Phil made lasting contributions to the ongoing success of MTA and its annual conventions.
In 1974, Phil decided that the MTA trade show was just not the event it should be. Typically, about 15 businesses would come to the annual conventions to show their wares. Phil got on the phone and started calling potential exhibitors and got over 50 businesses to come to the convention, establishing the trade show as one of the highlights of the annual confab.
Another innovation Phil came up with was the idea of providing buses for conventioneers, so they could unwind at the various convention affairs without worrying about having to drive back to the headquarters hotel.
Phil made his mark in the Great Falls tavern scene by other measures, as well.
At one time, there was a definite color line in Great Falls bars, which finally came to a head. An Air Force major from Malmstrom Air Force Base, who happened to be black, came into the Minnie House for a drink. I told him, I m sorry, I can t serve you. The officer said, Why not? I said, That s our policy.
That incident led to a summons to the Air Force Base to explain himself, with the Air Force threatening to put the Minneapolis House off limits to military personnel. Phil says, That didn t bother me too much'; I never had much military business, anyway.
In any event, the incident brought things to a head, culminating with a tense and angry six-hour meeting of the CCTA, at the end of which Phil stood up and announced, The Minneapolis House is now serving blacks.
Years later, Phil comments, I wasn t too popular for awhile. Everybody thought it would be the end. Still, he s content that he did the right thing and wonders why it took so long. I had black friends and I d see them on the street and I d ask, Where have you been? They d reply, Well, you won't serve us. "
As it happened, after Phil s big policy change, the first African American to be served in the Minneapolis House was none other than jazz legend Louis Armstrong, of whom Phil says, I was a big fan of his.
In his personal life, Phil married Donna Richardson, the daughter of his boss at the restaurant in Black Eagle, and they had six children: Tom, Rob, Paul, Phil, Diane and Malachy.
Paul talked about growing up with the business and fondly remembered that when they were children, On Sundays, we d go to the earliest mass, and then after church we d all go to the Minneapolis House, which was closed on Sundays at that time, and we d help give the place a good cleaning. We d get down on our hands and knees to scrub the floor and lower walls. We d each get a silver dollar and a bottle of Coke.
Donna died of cancer in 1973. Phil remarried, and both Phil and Paul start laughing at that memory. It lasted about an hour, Phil recalls.
To say they later had an amicable divorce is an understatement. The night before our divorce became final, we went out for dinner, partied all night, spent the night together, and appeared before the judge, the next morning, with major hangovers.
Phil Horning is spending his retirement years enjoying life and likes to spend time with his grandchildren and great-grandchildren and probably has a lot of great stories to tell them about earlier years in Great Falls and the Minnie House.
Source: The Montana Tavern Times, October, 2008, published monthly by Continental Communications, 125 W. Granite St., Suite 102, Butte, MT 59701.