Omaha Exploration

At the intersection of 10th and Howard between the Old Market and what was Jobber’s Canyon is the Howard Hotel. Constructed in 1909, the hotel benefited from its strategic location. While its life as a hotel ended in 1969 just as the area was being transformed into the entertainment district we all recognize today, its ground floor has been the home to a variety of restaurants and bars over the years. While we previously explored the Howard Street facing Mister Toad, today we will explore the 10th Street storefront.

From the time the hotel was constructed until at least 1938, 420 S 10th Street was the home to Howard Cafe. Its proximity to the produce hub to its west, wholesale district to its east and the railroad no doubt made it a busy spot to get a bite to eat for decades. It advertised having the best home cooked foods, pastries and coffee for the money. By 1948 however the cafe closed its doors to be replaced with the Market Cigar Store. Interestingly, this exact spot was home to a cigar store as far back as 1890 before the Howard Hotel was constructed. This iteration however was actually just a cover for a booking making operation. Before being caught, its owner once said in taped conversations, “nobody buys ‘em, I smoke ‘em up myself.” 

That marked the beginning of what may be the Old Market’s oldest continually operating bar. While the owners and the names have changed over the decades, its primary purpose has remained the same. Starting as the Sensation Bar in 1950. There was little published about the Sensation in the Omaha World-Herald except one notable exception which was a break-in which the burglars entered an adjacent cafe, went to the basement and entered the bar by breaking through the plaster wall that separated the two establishments.

Before bowling enthusiast Cab Nociate opened the Papio Bowl in 1958, he operated Cab’s Bar at 420 S 10th Street. That same year he apparently bet his bowling mates that if he finished last in the Goodfellow’s League at Chops Bowling Alley that he would walk all the way from his bar to Trentino’s barking like a dog while saying I am a dog between barks. He, in fact, finished last.

Nick Pillege was the next proprietor to operate a bar in this space when he opened Nick’s Bar in 1958. To celebrate the Nebraska Centennial in 1967, he installed a new log cabin front and decorated the inside with charcoal decor. His wasn’t the only business to do this as similar old time store fronts were common during the Golden Spike days of 1939. Nick didn’t stop there as he also renamed his Old Market bar the Ye Olde Inn. By this point the produce merchants largely abandoned the area leaving many buildings in the old City Market abandoned. It was, however, beginning its transformation to the Old Market. Mister Toad had just opened around the corner and along with French Cafe across the street, the area was beginning to show new life.

Two friends who had met while working at Gallagher’s, Mike Pueppke and Kevin Massara, bought the location for $65,000 in 1982. The self-described “poor boys who borrowed a dollar from all of their friends” spent another $20,000 to make the space which already included antique fixtures their own. The renovated space had exposed brick walls and floors and was decorated primarily in Egyptian red, a color that is somewhere between crimson and orange. They replaced the chandeliers to improve the lighting and added table tops that were created from sections of the bowling lanes from the Music Box, a bowling alley and ballroom that once stood at 19th and Capitol Ave. Other touches included French lithographs, ceiling fans and a canopied entrance.

They named the bar W. S. Walcott after a traveling medicine man who went up and down the Missouri River in the mid-1800’s selling elixirs. Leaning into the theme, the menu read: “We, the proprietors of this establishment, want in no way to reflect Walcott’s occasional penchant for misrepresenting his products; however, we do salute his zest for living and his ability to derive the maximum yield out of a monetary investment.” Perhaps inspired by the popular new bar, the Old Market put on an 1880’s style medicine show during River City Roundup in 1983. An Omaha-based actor portrayed Walcott using a Union Pacific flatcar at 9th and Howard as his stage. 

From its kitchen the restaurant remained open until midnight and offered appetizers, sandwiches, salads, soups, omelets, crepes and desserts and a short wine and Dom Perignon. Rather than having live music on the weekends, they instead had musicians perform on Sunday and Monday nights. 

By the time Barry O’Halloran took over the space, the one-time hotel rooms on the second and third floors were being turned into eight apartments. The O’Halloran family owned and operated a number of the most popular bars across town so it was no surprise that when Barry opened Barry O’s, it proved to be a big hit. The Creighton Bluejay bar is also a popular stop on St. Patrick’s Day and during the College World Series pre-dating the tournaments move to the downtown stadium. It serves as a sort of homebase for Virginia Cavalier fans whenever they make their way to Omaha as its baseball coach, Brian O’Connor, worked at the bar while playing for Creighton. 

The ground floor of the Howard Hotel is home to not only the oldest bar in the Old Market, Mister Toad, it is also home to a storefront that has continually operated as a bar since 1950. While names and owners have changed over the last 74 years, its hard to imagine a space that has operated any longer as a bar especially considering the area was largely abandoned by the time it transitioned from produce hub to nightlife hot spot. Having said that, my future exploration of bars in the area will determine whether that is correct.

2023 photos looking inside Barry O’s with the skylight still sitting atop the bar. Courtesy of Scooter’s Bar Journal.

Content written by Omaha Exploration. Feel free to leave a comment or a suggestion. Until then, keep exploring!

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