(WBBM NEWSRADIO) — The owners of a River North bar wanted a piece of old Chicago in their place, and now they’re installing the 99-year-old bar that used to sit in the now-closed Southport Lanes.
The co-owner of Mom’s Place bar, Ron Prokaski, said he used to live close to Southport Lanes in the 1980s and would go there all the time.
“I grew up going to the old man bars with my grandpa. Give me a can of Kayo, and I’d play the Puck Bowling game while he talked to his buddies and took their bets to go place at the racetrack,” he recalled Friday.
“I love the old stuff.”
So, he bid on the nearly century-old bar that was in Southport Lanes and got it for $700.
Prokaski says the bar has held up fairly well.
Except the night before he was going to pick it up, somebody broke into Southport Lanes and stole the brass elements.
“I don’t know what kind of money you get for scrap brass. But it is what it is, at this point,” he said.
Now, he said he’ll fix it up and put back the wooden beer kegs that once graced the length of the 27-foot-long bar.
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