New Albany is a state of mind … but whose? Since 2004, we’ve been observing the contemporary scene in this slowly awakening old river town. If it’s true that a pre-digital stopped clock is right twice a day, when will New Albany learn to tell time?
Showing posts with label The Hibernian Bar (Hi-B). Show all posts
Showing posts with label The Hibernian Bar (Hi-B). Show all posts
Leading off, I'm six months late to the news, but it's better than not knowing at all. A few days back a weird urge struck me to do a Google search, and I learned that Brian O'Donnell, esteemed owner of the Hi-B (Hibernian) Bar in Cork, Ireland, died last December. I wrote an appreciation at Food & Dining Magazine.
When O’Donnell died last December, the Irish Examiner’s eulogy by Dan Buckley painted a picture of curmudgeonly eccentricity, undoubted erudition and sheer longevity; O’Donnell’s parents had owned the bar since 1924 when he took it over in the early 1960s, and his wife and daughter continued the family tradition when age and ill health compelled him to retire.
O'Donnell was well into his 80s, although his actual date of birth seems not to have been revealed anywhere. It's genuinely true: they don't make 'em like him any longer, and that's too bad.
Every modern theory on hospitality management of which I'm aware frowns on throwing a customer's mobile phone out the open window or banning visitors for chewing gum.
And no, I never consciously modeled my own career as publican (1990 - 2015) on O'Donnell's mindset. He and I met only twice, maybe three times, on those very occasions from 1987 when visiting Cork. However, he struck up a friendship with my cousin. I'd have enjoyed sitting in the corner and listening as they debated politics and sang operatic arias together.
Rest in power, Brian O'Donnell.
Today's second item concerns draft Dogfish Head SeaQuench Ale, which will be sold at Pints&union by the growler starting tomorrow (May 20). SeaQuench is a very new-school way of thinking about formulating a beer, but incorporates old-school styles from Germany in route to urging margarita cocktail lovers to try it. I wrote about SeaQuench at the Pints&union website. Each day this week I'll be adding a short refresher about the draft beers we currently are pouring into growlers for take-away.
I am delighted, thrilled and hopeful to see these many recent media references to the post-lockdown period as a propitious time to reassess American society's attitudes toward a panoply of head-scratching alcoholic beverage laws.
By my standards, surviving notes are positively florid.
Day 104 ... Tuesday, July 28
Rosslare → Cork. City Hostel, pub crawling w/Tommy, bearded Cyprus vet, etc
Day 105 ... Wednesday, July 29
Cork. Day with Tommy to the south -- Kinsale, etc
Day 106 ... Thursday, July 30
Cork. Walk to University College, up highlands. Political conversation at the Hi-B
I can't speak for the present time, but in far-off 1987, trains weren't tremendously useful in the Republic of Ireland.
Granted, they accepted Eurailpass, and this was occasionally helpful from a budgetary standpoint. However, too few passenger rail lines radiated out from Dublin -- not unlike spokes on half of a wagon wheel -- and they seldom were connected to each other in the hinterlands.
A network of reasonably frequent buses linked them, but buses weren't on the Eurailpass, and one was compelled to pay by the trip.
So, Barrie and I were at there at the O'Leary farm in Rosslare, bound for Cork, and we made it there at some point during the day on Tuesday, though how we managed it eludes me.
I've spent an hour trying to determine whether we took a train from Rosslare to Limerick via Waterford, then south to Cork, or a bus for some or all of this route. Operational passenger trains are fewer in number now, and while my gut tells me we rode the rails the entire way, I cannot be sure.
Cork, the Irish Republic's second largest city, lies on the island's southern coast. The city was the home of Tommy Barker, a good friend of my cousin Don's, who in 1987 was a reporter for the Cork Examiner newspaper. In fact, he's still there, 30 years later, more recently covering the property (real estate) beat.
(My guess is that real estate writers are a recent phenomenon in Ireland, given the country's great leap forward during the 1990s.)
Once in Cork, we made a beeline for the City Hostel, which was a tad ramshackle but had available space. Our bunk beds came perilously close to disintegrating when we first climbed into them (balsa does that), and the coin-operated shower's slot mechanism was hanging from the wall by wires that may or may not have been live.
When asked about this, the good-natured desk clerk merely shrugged. Nothing much was connected to electricity, he said. Just turn on the water and have at it, but it probably won't get hot -- and we could pay him for the shower if we felt like it, or not.
The great thing about Cork is that it had not one, but two of its own classic Irish Dry Stouts: Murphy's and Beamish. Sadly, they've long since ceased to be independent, but add the ubiquity of draft Guinness, and the city was a stout-lover's dream.
One bar we found had all three on tap at once. By contrast, there may have been two Guinness taps in all of Louisville at the time.
Don had tipped Tommy to expect one or both of us, and I called him at the newspaper. He suggested we meet at a pub called The Long Valley, and it went swimmingly. I remember having sandwiches there, and wondering if I'd ever be able to grasp what the older local bar flies were saying, in English -- such was the local accent.
I also recall being fascinated by out-in-the-open, legal bookmaking. Casinos hadn't yet come to Indiana in 1987.
We'd already had at least two pints elsewhere on the way to the Long Valley, and after wrapping our session with Tommy, he made sure we found the drinking establishment both he and cousin Don had recommended: the Hibernian (Hi-B) Bar, which I wrote about earlier in 2017.
It was one floor up the stairs, with the restrooms halfway down a different set of steps.
One of our temporary drinking buddies was a bearded and bedraggled veteran of Ireland's UN peacekeeping force of infantrymen force in Cyprus, circa 1970. When asked if he'd ever witnessed combat in the war between Greeks and Turks, he said no, not exactly; it had been his sensible expedient to turn and run whenever shooting broke out.
Somehow on Wednesday, we managed to shake off the lengthy Tuesday session and meet Tommy for a drive in his van to Kinsale, a town on the coast just 20 miles south from Cork.
The Spaniard (above) and the Armada House (now Armada Bar) are still in operation. Here's the street view in 2011.
The names of these drinking establishments refer to the landing of the Spaniards at Kinsale in 1601, resulting in a siege and battle.
Tongue perhaps planted firmly in cheek, Tommy also saw to it that we absorbed the cultural attraction at Ballinspittle. It is a grotto with a back story.
The explanation is here, in this period video.
On Thursday, Tommy returned to work and the Hoosiers embarked on a long walk through Cork, taking us to the university and hilly viewpoints to the southwest of the city center, and including the Beamish & Crawford brewery. There were no tours, but we were content to smell stout merrily cooking.
What is this overgrown thing? I've no idea, though I was a sucker for ruins.
At the Long Valley on our first day in Cork, Tommy had confirmed what we'd seen on posters around town: U2 was playing a show on Saturday, August 8 at Páirc Uí Chaoimh, the football stadium on the east side of town.
He had to work and couldn't attend, but Barrie and I duly purchased tickets and commenced an itinerary scheme. We'd head out into the Irish countryside for a week, then circle back to Cork for the concert. Tommy magnanimously offered to let us stay at his cottage for a couple of days, then we'd move in the direction of Rosslare and a boat ride back to France.
It's been 30 years since I climbed the stairs to the first floor (in Europe, that's how they're numbered) and beheld the cramped majesty of the Hi-B. Somewhere up or down another set of stairs was the loo. The publican Brian O'Donnell was a legend even then, and as I write, it is my earnest hope that he's still alive and scowling.
Brian O'Donnell in 2008.
Barrie Ottersbach and I were in Cork, Ireland in 1987. In fact, we were there twice. The first time through town, we stayed at a ramshackle youth hostel and met briefly with a newspaperman named Tommy Barker. He's still at it.
After learning that U2 would be playing at Cork's soccer stadium in a week's time, we decided to wander the countryside and circle back. But first, Tommy directed us to the Hibernian (Hi-B) Bar, a legendary institution recommended to us by my cousin Donald Barry, who knew the Irish newspaperman when he was an exchange student in America.
We might have come back for second pint on another night. I can't remember, such was the merriment of what surely was the better part of an entire day spent drinking with a succession of incredible characters -- not to mention the proprietor Brian himself, with whom Professor Barry had become such good friends that they'd listen to opera together before, during and after hours at the bar.
One of our temporary drinking buddies was a bearded and bedraggled veteran of Ireland's UN peacekeeping force of infantrymen force in Cyprus, circa 1970. When asked if he'd ever witnessed combat in the war between Greeks and Turks, he said no, not exactly; it had been his sensible expedient to turn and run whenever shooting broke out.
Another, better groomed barfly at the Hi-B was a musician who modestly assured us that he'd played with every major pop and rock star of the sixties and seventies. His name didn't strike a chord, but there was an explanation for this, because he'd often appeared uncredited on albums to avoid tax and the prying eyes of ex-wives.
As the bar tab piled up (the two visiting Americans were happy to do the buying), I kept throwing names at the musician. From Van Morrison to David Bowie, and Rory Gallagher to Phil Lynott, he fielded them effortlessly, complete with record dates and concert gigs.
Finally, I thought I'd stumped him: What about Pete Townshend of The Who?
He paused, then admitted he hadn't ever played music with Townshend ... but one time he was driving on the motorway somewhere in England, and stopped to help some poor bloke who was trying to change a tire in the rain ...
That's right. It was Townshend, who offered the helpful good Irish Samaritan one of his guitars in return, but of course he couldn't accept it ...
So it went. We emerged in the wee hours reeking of cigarette smoke and walked back to the hostel, roughly 75 (Irish) Pounds lighter. Following are a collection of links, the most recent of which is from October, 2016.
Cousin Don has kept me posted about Brian over the years, and each update has warned of his friend's imminent retirement. The funny thing? My entire career as a curmudgeonly publican has come and gone since the last time I drank at the Hi-B ... and yet I'm not feeling retired quite yet.
... Yet every few years Brian has managed to attract a new generation to the Hi-B. This is just as well because every now and then he will decide on a mass culling of clientele, and if it wasn’t for the large proportion of young imbibers, there would be nobody left.
So why do people return again and again? Hardly for the decor and certainly not for the dungeon-like gents’. There is only one word for it — craic, beloved of hard drinkers and easy listeners.
And the more cracked you are, the better.
More recently ...
Hi-B, by Julie Daunt (The Culture Trip) 27 October 2016
Situated on Oliver Plunkett Street and up a flight of stairs is the renowned and sometimes notorious Hi-B. Its full name is the Hibernian Bar, but it is known far and wide by its shortened name. The bar is housed in what was once the Hibernian Hotel, and it is perhaps one of the most intimate and eccentric places to have a pint in Cork. What’s more, mobile phones are forbidden, meaning there is always a din of real conversation and laughter. This is enforced by the owner Brian O’Donnell, who is a Cork institution in himself. Fancy frills and sleek decor are left outside the door of this traditional pub. A step back in time, there is always a blazing fire, a cold pint of stout and story to be heard at the Hi-B.
Hi-B, 108 Oliver Plunkett Street, Cork, Ireland, +353 21 427 2758
The golfer asked Brian to order him a taxi. After a few minutes a rather agitated taxi driver ran up the stairs, stuck his head in the door and announced himself - “taxi!” He was probably double parked on the busy street outside and anxious to get going. Still seated, the golfer slowly turned to address him and eventually said:-
NA Confidential's mask-free policy on reader comments.
NA Confidential believes in a higher bar than is customary in the blogosphere, and follows a disclosure policy with respect to reader comments.
First, you must be registered with blogger.com according to the procedures specified. This is required not as a means of directing traffic to blogger.com, but to reduce the lamentable instances of flaming and personal attacks on the part of the anonymous.
Second, although pen names are perfectly acceptable, senior editor Roger A. Baylor must be informed of your identity, and according to your preference, it will be kept confidential.
To reiterate, I insist upon this solely to lessen the frequency of malicious anonymity, which unfortunately plagues certain other blogs hereabouts.
You may e-mail Roger at the address given within his profile and explain who you are. Failure to comply means that your comments probably will be deleted -- although the final decision remains ours.
Thanks for reading, and please consider becoming a part of the community here, one that is respectful of the prerequisites of civilized discourse, and that seeks to engage visitors in substantive dialogue.
