Coach and Four

Address: 54 Broadway

Old Address: 61 Broadway

Other names: A & P, Adirondack Enterprise

Year built:

The Coach and Four opened in 1972 and closed in 1973.

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Adirondack Daily Enterprise, January 26, 1972

Cleveland Drank Here And You Can Too Pretty Soon

By BILL MCLAUGHLIN

Individuals who profess to be modern in every other way will sometimes express a desire to sleep where George Washington slept, bathe in Cleopatra’s tub or sip champagne from the slipper of Isadora Duncan. Such people will get a vicarious thrill in stepping up to the bar at the Coach and Four, a new cafe opening on the site of the former Burger Family restaurant opposite the Post Office.

Bill Grogan the proprietor who will open about February 1 says the new bar which has a history dating from the 1860s; catered to such luminaries as President Cleveland, Mark Twain, Vernon Castle, NYS Governor Roswell Flower, Colonel Cannon, Daddy and Peaches Browning and the notorious Legs Diamond, gangland’s bad boy of the 20s.

The bar was originally custom built to blend with the decor of the Riverside Inn on Main and River Streets when the hotel was built around 1861.

When the hotel was torn down in the 1930’s the bar was moved to Al Chapple‘s establishment on the opposite comer of Main Street at River. Later Dick DeSantis ran the bar for Lefty Mahaney and operated under the name of the Riverside Bar until it was razed in the 1950s to make way for the Texaco Service Station presently operated by Bob Nadoon.

The bar which is an antiquity of merit and design maintains its basic artistic conformation though some of the small rococco or gingerbread and filigree has been lost through handling and the destructive processes of time.

The Riverside Inn at the turn of the century operated by Pine and Corbett was considered a very plush hostelry and catered to a wealthy class of summer residents and travellers. Patients were also accommodated. At $20 a week.

In its latter day location the bar, a gem of architectural eminence deteriorated to a degree and its polished veneer was hidden under countless applications of varnish and stain until it reached a shade bordering on ebony. The bar was stored in a garage at the Floyd Jones camp on Lower Saranac not too distant from the Mark Twain Camp on the same shore for many years and again suffered the ravages of cold weather storage.

When Bill Grogan decided to open a Broadway business he felt this particular bar would best characterize the restaurant and set the tone he desired. The painstaking job of restoring the bar to its original finish involved about 300 hours of laborious sanding and continuous applications of chemicals designed to eat through the collective layering of stain and grime.

Gradually the beauty of the wood became discernible and missing pieces that could be reproduced were set in place. The back bar which originally held three separate mirrors will be basically the same except for the center section.

If you have an urge to blend in with the nostalgic 1800s or the exciting era of Flaming Youth later on it might be stimulating to wander in and have a Champagne cocktail at Ye Old Riverside Bar now an integral part of the Coach and Four.

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