Vogel’s which opened as a roadhouse and saloon in 1896 was founded by George Vogel. His wife served patrons a free potato salad lunch and the picnic grove behind the saloon was very popular, especially the outdoor bowling with wooden pins and balls. Vogel’s was at 7200 Harrison, where the UHaul is today. It was taken down to make way for the expressway, and the horse trough is long gone.
John Boehm and Toby Zapfel both from Austria, met tending bar at Thoede House. Their friendship lead to business partnership and the purchased the tavern at 16 Lathrop from Max Schultz. Click the link about to learn read about the history of August Thode’s restaurant or Max Schultz’s tavern.
Although a carwash today, this was once a tavern owned by Mr. Lobisher starting in 1903. It was the closest saloon to Concordia Cemetery and served pork chops and sauerkraut. Carl Abrath, a German immigrant, purchased it in 1940. His wife, Nellie, was Lithuanian and learned english over the years. She was known as “Ma Abrath,” and had many patrons look after her when Carl passed suddenly.
Vic and Vi Bisluk, veterans in the tavern business, purchased the saloon at 7737 Roosevelt Road (now McGaffer’s) around 1951. Photo from the July 21,1955 Forest Park Review.
When the Northwestern Railroad built a roundhouse at Desplaines Avenue and Harrison Street, there was a saloon called Harlem House where men could get a stein after a hard day’s work. A decade or so later, in the 1870’s, Forest Park became the biggest cemetery area in northern Illinois, and the all-day trip of mourners required refreshments, often at Thode House or Gadens, both on Madison Street and Desplaines Avenue.
By 1955, Forest Park had 55 tavern licenses. It was not known as a “night club” town, however, but as a “friendly tavern” town, an oasis supported, ironically, by the good residents of “dry” Oak Park, River Forest and Maywood.
On the south end of town, at Desplaines Avenue and Roosevelt Road, was Vic and Vi’s at 7737 Roosevelt Road (present day McGaffer’s), where Friday night crowds waited impatiently for potato pancakes and the fish fry. In earlier days the bar was Frank’s Old Time Tavern, closely tied to the racetrack and cemeteries south of Roosevelt Road.
Click through for more photos and stories of Forest Park’s saloons of 1955.
McGaffers, once Vic and Vi’s was Frank’s Old Time Tavern. view the 1938 film clip of Frank’s Old Time Tavern.
Boehm and Zepfel’s have early ties to Thode’s Restaurant. To read more about August Thode and his druid burial, click here.
The friends, Boehm and Zeptel, purchased their saloon from Max Schultz, read more about early saloons and “rushing the growler” here.
To read more about Vogel’s click here.
