It is rumoured Bob Zimmerman liked Curly’s Bar

This was Curly’s Bar on Stuart Road on the way up to Beauty Mountain, near Little Island Lake and Coons Creek, in Bengal, Minnesota, about 15 miles southwest of Hibbing. Curly, a.ka. John Ruff, put up a sign “Short Cut to Minneapolis” bringing custom from the main road, Highway 73. It was NOT a short cut to Minneapolis. Especially if you stopped for a drink and some poetry reading! Curly had two hearing aids, but they did not work well. And Curly had a black dog called Pepper.

It was an under-the-counter type bar, without a licence. If you look on the map it is well off main roads in the middle of nowhere. Curly was a poet and not too worried about the age of his patrons. He sold Good Old Guckenheimer rye whiskey and beer. The whiskey must have been old stock as the Guckenheimer distillery was long out of business. Or was it moonshine whiskey poured into Good Old Guckenheimer bottles?

It is rumoured Bob Zimmerman liked the place — under age drinking, poetry, hand dipped ice cream, a small bowling alley, cabins and plywood boats for romance… Ice fishing in winter.

But we have no certain proof. Anyone know more?

“Good Old Guckenheimer, perhaps the most prestigious of the Monongahela whiskeys. The name Monongahela comes from the Monongahela River Valley, which came to be identified with a specific type of whiskey. Made from rye grain, with little or no corn (maize), it featured a deep, reddish-brown color and a distinctive flavor… Monongahela rye isn’t a whiskey for the debonair. It’s pretty rough ‘n’ tumble stuff, the character of which was shaped by it’s long and arduous journey from where it was distilled to where it was consumed. Locally, the whiskey was probably drunk unaged, the same as any other whiskey was at that time.”