Bygone taverns of Union City, remembering the cold beer, live music, crowds - and danger

Layden's Restaurant was a pretty nondescript business in Union City's late 1970s landscape. A white, two-story, house-like structure with a slight tilt, it stood along North Main Street, bookended by the railroad tracks and a gas station where the Union City branch of the Corry Federal Credit Union now stands.

But for those of us who'd attained legal imbibing age, or at least looked the part, the bar at the front of the building had an unusual and kitschy quality we called our own. First, due to gentlemanly proprietor Francis Layden's visual impairments, the space was sufficiently lit that we joked we could perform surgery on the pool table if necessary.

Francis…tall, thin, and in his mid-70s at the time, was positively civilized in his ever-present white collared shirt and tie. He contrasted sharply with his young, grungier clientele, many of whom throughout the day were either headed to or exiting a first-, second- or third-shift job at one of Union City's many manufacturing plants, or unwinding after a South Erie County League softball game, or just wetting their whistles.

Having a visual impairment and running a bar might have been problematic at some other time or place, but not at Layden's. As a matter of course while seated at the bar, we would tell Francis the denomination of the bills we handed him. Otherwise, he would scrutinize them under a bright light behind the bar, before sliding them into the drawer and withdrawing the appropriate change by feel and memory.

There was never a danger of anyone taking advantage of Francis. The regular crowd was always alert to strangers, ensuring honest transactions.

The tavern's other endearing quality was the absolute frostiness of the beer, pulled from the large, upright, decades-old, wood-and-glass cooler at the far end of the bar. The occasional frozen-solid beer aside, that chilly assurance along with 40-cent quart bottles helped make it one of our regular haunts.

Like all bars everywhere at the time, each Union City tavern had its own quirky persona. One owner of the former Roosevelt Inn on Route 97 west of town got annoyed by having too many customers. Clearly a fish out of water, he merely tolerated us being there.

I'm sure his reticent demeanor had nothing to do with our sparkling wit, abundant charm, and endless quarters for the juke box.

Steve Bishop: Union City and Corry show how even small communities can leverage native assets and grow

Back in the borough, the now long-gone "Crooked Street" tavern across from the Union City Chair plant hosted those employees before and after their shifts, as well as during work breaks. No judgment here…it was a working man's bar, and it was a different time.

The Pine Woods Inn — later Mr. B's — on Route 6 east of town, hosted live music on the weekends. The bands drew the ladies, which by the laws of nature attracted an overload of testosterone. Those factors, combined with no nearby police presence, made it a true "keep your head on a swivel" environment.

Today for a variety of reasons, most small-town bars have been replaced by fraternal organizations…the Moose, VFW, American Legion. Union City has one privately owned bar/restaurant remaining, Kim's Townhouse downtown on Main Street, which is for sale for anyone keen on keeping the tradition alive.

Looking back nearly a half-century in any objective way is difficult, but it was clearly a more dangerous time. Families routinely had four, five and six kids instead of one, two or three, and there were just way more people out and about, doing dangerous things.

The pre-internet world was smaller. Genuine or imagined rivalries existed between guys from nearby communities, and strangers were suspect. Going to a bar or club included an inherent understanding someone was likely there solely to incite violence.

The societal push to make drinking-and-driving the crime it deserved to be wasn't yet fully under way, muscle cars and motorcycles were in their heyday, seat belts were arbitrary, vehicles didn't have today's safety features, and bar owners simply had to live with a certain level of danger and liability.

As if that weren't enough, the drive to have alcohol-fueled "fun" was compounded by New York's minimum legal drinking age of only 18. That sent an entire generation of 18-, 19- and 20-year-olds over the border most weekends, navigating the snake-like roads to the bowling alley in nearby Cutting, New York, or to Jamestown. What could possibly go wrong?

I appreciate that time and my place in it, but I'm not nostalgic about it. It was dangerous, whether you were drinking or victimized by someone who was. In or around my peer group at the time, I could recount a remarkably long and tragic list of young men who were killed or seriously injured in car and motorcycle accidents.

The rest of us, frankly, just got lucky.

More: Paying attention to rural Erie County is as important as supporting Erie's rebound

Steve Bishop hails from Union City, spent 15 years as a newspaper reporter, editor and columnist, and 22 years with the Corry Higher Education Council before retiring. He now moonlights in community development.

This article originally appeared on Erie Times-News: Steve Bishop recalls beloved taverns of Union City in the 1970s