Bygone Bars and Brewhouses of North Reading
While many of us are familiar with North Reading’s agricultural and industrial heritage, its centuries-old reputation as a haven for barflies and party animals is less well-known. From the early 1800s through the late 1970s, North Reading was a drinker’s paradise where—apart from a few brief libatory droughts—both locals and visitors from neighboring ‘dry’ communities could come and belly up to the bar. In following brief snapshot, Matthew T. Page tells the story of our town’s bygone bars, taverns, and cocktail lounges.
A tavern depicted in Isaac Weld’s Travels, through the States of North America (1799).
Early Watering Holes
One of North Reading’s earliest taverns stood near Lobs Pound Mill in the West Village, not far from the intersection of Mill and Park Streets. Established by local farmer Eliezer Flint around 1750, this hostelry sat along the main road that snaked its way north from Boston. This circuitous route predated the arrow-straight Medford to Andover Turnpike—built in during the early 1800s—that is now Route 28.
The Flint Tavern was famous for its ‘flip’: a popular 18th century concoction that was George Washington’s favorite drink. Made with ale, sugar syrup, rum, and aromatic spices, flips were mixed with a hot poker and served warm.
During the Revolutionary War, the Flint Tavern also served as a convenient rallying point for local militiamen who frequently trained atop nearby Sanborn Hill. The Flint Tavern closed sometime in the early 1800s, though it is unclear exactly when.
Approximate historical location of the Flint Tavern.
Shortly after the Flint Tavern closed, another prominent local family—the Damons—built a spacious tavern in the town center to serve as a major stop on two intersecting stagecoach routes (Salem to Lowell & Boston to Haverhill).
Constructed circa 1817 and later extended, the tavern featured 21 rooms, the town’s first post office, and several barns and stables to accommodate a large number of coach horses. The building would continue to function as a tavern until just after the Civil War.
The Damon Tavern today.
In the 1830s, the Damons commissioned renowned painter Rufus Porter to decorate the tavern’s second floor ballroom with a stunning series of murals. Easy to reach yet still somewhat out of the way, the Damon Tavern became a place where well-heeled Bay Staters could come and carouse in relative luxury away from prying eyes.
The Damon Tavern’s reputation as an out-of-town party spot was no doubt boosted by the fact that Americans’ alcohol consumption peaked during the 1830s. Recent research reveals that Americans at that time were drinking the annual equivalent (per capita) of 90 bottles of 80-proof liquor: more than three times as much as they consume today.
In addition to the Damon Tavern, nineteenth century North Reading had several other public houses. The nearby Nichols Tavern operated from 1818 to 1825 before it was purchased and converted into a schoolhouse. In early-to-mid 1800s, the Barnard House tavern served thirsty travelers plying the Andover Turnpike (now Main Street) from a two-story wooden structure located near the modern-day Eastgate Plaza. A major stagecoach relay station, the Barnard House could accommodate more than thirty horses at a time. Another tavern owned by Abijiah Flint (grandson of Eliezer) also served up libations to turnpike travelers.
A typical early nineteenth century stagecoach relay.
A Short-Lived Dry Spell
Like a spilled drink, North Reading’s turnpike trade soon evaporated as trains superseded stagecoaches as the primary means of intercity travel. Over time, the passing trade that kept the town’s watering holes busy diminished. By the 1860s, annual town reports show that North Reading had just one or two businesses licensed to sell liquor. By that time, once busy inns like the Damon Tavern and Abijiah’s Tavern had been converted to other uses.
In the late nineteenth century, North Reading’s thirstiness declined further as the Temperance movement gained traction locally. This can be seen in the town’s 1888 budget, in which it spent $100 for the “suppression of liquor traffic.” Judging by these records and the lack of dispensaries listed in North Reading’s 1909 business directory, the next two decades constituted one of the driest periods in the town’s history. But with the advent of automobile travel, things began to change.
Early the following decade, a tavern known as the Pinehurst Club operated on the corner of Park and Central streets. It later moved to a historic home (since demolished) near the intersection of Winter and Main streets. Around this time another tavern opened on North Street, near the modern-day Hillview Golf Course. These hostelries undoubtedly closed with the arrival of Prohibition.
As in any other town in the country, Prohibition made it harder—but not impossible—for North Reading locals to enjoy their favorite tipple. After all, Prohibition’s enabling law (the Volstead Act) did not make it illegal to consume alcohol. In fact, it allowed individuals to produce up to 200 gallons of wine and cider for personal use each year.
This loophole made North Reading—a town famous for its many apple orchards—somewhat of a cider production hotspot during the Prohibition Era (1920-1933). In 1924, Willard Turner built a cider mill on Main Street: a sign that North Reading’s definition of ‘homemade’ was fungible. This beverage factory would later become the Horse Shoe Club—an earlier, grittier incarnation of today’s Horseshoe Grille. Town records from 1930 also show a cider mill being operated near the same location by the Ellington family.
Interior of a cider mill in New Boston, New Hampshire (1908).
During Prohibition, North Reading also had a thriving speakeasy located in a building on or near a modern-day pub (Sports, Spirits, and Steaks). Operated by Boston-based restaurateur Jack Levaggi, this covert drinking spot was raided by police on several occasions, but to no avail. Reminiscing about the speakeasy in 1980s, one North Reading local is quoted as saying that there was “a secret to it.”
The Rise and Fall of North Reading Bar Culture
After Prohibition ended, local entrepreneurs opened multiple liquor stores and pouring spots. In 1934, George Vorrilas—a Greek-American WWI veteran—opened the town’s first post-repeal package store on Main Street. Around this time, Martins Pond residents began sipping drinks at the Pond Club on Lakeside Boulevard.
Post-WWII, famed Boston restaurateur Jack Levaggi opened his eponymous fine dining establishment and cocktail lounge that attracted diners from across eastern Massachusetts until it closed in 1960.
(L-R): Ad for Bonfanti’s; Riders matchbook; Levaggi’s matchbook.
By the mid-1950s, North Reading’s other watering holes—some upscale, some more low-key—included Bonfanti’s Italian Villa, Kitty’s Lunch, Riders (later The Topper), the Middlesex Club (also known as the Stardust Club Lounge), Sullivan’s, the Horse Shoe Club, the Pond Club, the Hillview Country Club, the Moose Lodge, and the Oar and Anchor. Most were located on or near Main Street (Route 28), making them easy to reach from nearby ‘dry’ towns.
The iconic neon sign at Kitty’s Restaurant.
From the late 1940s through the mid-1960s, the Oar and Anchor—a family-friendly restaurant—was especially successful. But it was then sold and converted into a steak house that later became one of the biggest party destinations in Massachusetts: the Maverick.
It’s All in the Name
Despite its shifting cuisines (steakhouse, Polynesian, Italian) and relatively short lifespan (1967 to 1977), the Maverick looms large in North Reading’s collective memory.
Located at the corner of Main and Park streets where the Cota Funeral Home and Dunkin’ Donuts now sit, the Maverick’s blaring music, heaving dance floors, and rowdy reputation attracted legions of heavy-drinking music fans and party animals to North Reading. At its height, its bars played host to rock stars, Boston Bruins players, and—on busy weekends—up to a thousand “clubbies” in their early twenties.
By 1978, however, the Maverick’s roguish reputation had caught up with it. At a public meeting that year, the North Reading Select Board refused to renew its liquor license due to late night drinking, noise, and illegal parking problems.
Select Board members openly complained that their predecessors had granted liquor licenses too freely. Public comments were also damning. Townsperson (and longtime NRH&AS member) Barbara O’Brien told to the Board that “North Reading’s image has already been severely tarnished by the Maverick’s reputation,” and that “an establishment of this type is more trouble than it’s worth, and does severe harm to the quality of life in town.”
Advising against the renewal, Police Chief Gordon Berridge relayed that the Maverick played host to sixty-four bar fights, three stabbings, a bomb threat, and several reports of theft and property destruction between 1972 and 1976. Chief Berridge called the Maverick “a disgrace” and lamented how much time North Reading police spent responding to problems it caused.
The demise of the disgraced, debt-ridden Maverick marked the beginning of the end for North Reading’s dive bars. Other Main Street establishments went out of business or changed with the times, becoming more food-focused and family-friendly. Likewise, surrounding towns—whose drinkers had for decades made the evening commute to North Reading—became ‘wet’ themselves.
Fast forward to today, and it is notable that some of our town’s watering holes—Kitty’s, the Horseshoe, the Damon Tavern—have withstood the test of time, living on as reminders of North Reading’s thirsty past.
Do you have reminiscences, photos, or memorabilia of North Reading’s bygone bars and restaurants that you’d be willing to share? If so, please contact us at: info@nreadinghistory.org.
