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I learned
that Ken's was called The Miami in better days and thought The New
Miami would be a cool name. We closed for three months and gutted
the place. Tom Ford, Keith Schiller and others did a lot of the
work. Keith had used some barn like wood to cover a section of the
wall at Alvin's and I thought it would work in front part of the
bar. Not knowing of a lot of barns near by, I went down near the
Detroit Harbor Terminals and laying around in vacant lots down there
were hundreds of huge shipping crates for shipping steel in from
Europe. That January, with crowbar in hand I filled a couple
truckloads of Swedish Steel Crate wall covering for the bar.
Shadowfax standing outside the New Miami
Bill Hodgson, David Chambers, David Opatik, George Korinek
Picture compliments to Mike
Roper
Picture compliments to Mike
Roper
We opened with Shadowfax In February of 77. We had a great time for
awhile but the neighborhood was changing and business was not always
great.
Many of the apartment buildings around us including some nice ones
like the Coronado on Selden and Cass burned down. However there was
always the music. Cindy Laverty, John Kearny ,Bill Landlis, Dave
Chambers and Willy Vreeland had a great band, The Vibes. The
bluegrass band Harlin County, The Lords, The Rockabilly Cats, Bobby
McDonald, Mitch Ryder, Steve Nardella with the great Mr. B on piano
and George Bedard on guitar, Sonic's Rendevue, Wayne Kramer, Destroy
All Monsters, of coarse all the variations of Shadowfax, and many
many others. Like Cobb's we had a tight group of regulars. Toward
the end I was largely absent while working nights at Chevrolet
Detroit Gear and Axel. In February of 80 a group of losers who we
had trouble with over the years poured gas into the exhaust fan
opening and lit it on fire. Underinsured and lacking any sort of
cash reserve, that was the end of The New Miami. Ken exercised his
option and took the bar back.
Tom
Hagerty
( tjhagerty@aol.com) remembers:
"I probably shouldn't admit it but I
played on the first--and quite possibly last--men's softball team,
generously sponsored by New Miami owner Mike Roper.
If memory serves 'twas the summer of 1977 and we had a perfect
record: zero wins.
Teammates included my cousins (Jim, Dan and Paul Diehl), a guy named
Lurch (who drove a Cadillac with cow horns on the front hood), and
guys named Russ, LaDon, Monkey and Little Joe. I forget their last
names if I ever knew 'em.
I'm sure Roper learned his lesson and never spent the bar's money on
softball again."
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