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Written by Paul Raymore
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Tuesday, 06 May 2008 |
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A day many hoped would never come is looming large in the collective consciousness of Truckee locals. OB’s Pub and Restaurant, one of Truckee’s cornerstone downtown restaurants, plans to shut its doors Saturday after nearly 40 years of business.
OB’s opened in 1969 as OB’s Board, and gave many locals a reason to venture back into downtown after Interstate 80 took traffic, and people, away from the commercial core.
In celebration that history, Tahoe World Web Editor Paul Raymore sat down with owner Dick Howell, who has been a part of the restaurant since 1972, last week to talk about what OB’s has meant to the Truckee community.
Going out with a party:
Not one to go out without a party, Dick Howell is planning a three-day celebration May 8-10 to thank the local community for almost 40 years of good times. Thursday, May 8 will be the last chance for OB’s famous karaoke night, while Friday and Saturday, May 9 and 10, will be parties with live music by Paul Covarelli (Friday) and the Armadillo Boys (Saturday) at 8 p.m. For more information about any of the festivities, please call (530) 587-4164.
 35 years of memories with Dick Howell:
• I’ve been here since September of 1972. And I’ve been running it day to day since 1978.
• Just about every major deal in the last 25 years has happened here at OB’s. If these booths could talk, they’d tell you about just about every political and business deal that’s ever been done in town.
• It was like the town hall or something; if you didn’t go to Town Hall, maybe you came here. And upstairs we had many many meetings that shaped and formed the town. And at these booths, all the business people and architects and investors laid the foundation for many of the projects that have come to be.
• For so many years OB’s was known for our parties... 35 years of St. Patrick’s Days were kind of famous. We always had crazy times and people coming from all over. For years we had our Pray For Snow parties, and Hawaiian Night, we had our First Day of Irish Summer party. For a number of years we did this fashion show for Christmas that was a really fun party — we’d use the entire restaurant and local personalities would wear the clothes from local merchants. Those are just some of the ones that became traditions.
• It’s a very old building. It was a daily challenge maintaining 6,000 square feet of building that really hasn’t had much done to it since the early 1980s. Because it’s such an old building — it dates all the way back to the 1920s and so many people had gotten their hands on it and had done various things to it — every time something broke it was a real challenge to figure out the source of the problem.
 • Supposedly there are ghosts here. I’ve never seen them, but other people have seen ghosts. A lot of times the ghosts would be held responsible for the issues that would occur.
• After 35 years, I’m so emotionally tied to this place, and emotionally tied to the people, and to Truckee, and to what I like to call the spirit of Truckee — the mountains and the river and the railroad town. I’ve tried to create that atmosphere here and I believe that’s what’s carried us through 35 years.
• Obviously I’ve seen a lot of changes in Truckee, and they haven’t been all good, but they haven’t been all bad. For he most part I’m very optimistic about the future of Truckee. I really believe in that spirit and I’ve tried to maintain that here at OB’s so that when people come in they felt comfortable and they felt wanted, and it felt like what Truckee should feel like.
• I tried to keep the food contemporary as much as possible, but I also tried to maintain what I felt was that spirit of Truckee.
• I think that the steaks, from the first day we opened to the day we will close, are the essence of that feeling. And the ribs too. The ribs were so popular in the 1970s and 1980s, and they’re still popular today.
• All my steaks aren’t just steaks. Every single steak I have on there has some twist that makes it unique to OB’s. Whether it be the filet with blue cheese wrapped with bacon, or the Jack Daniels steak, which is a top sirloin, but we do whiskey onions and we marinate it in whiskey. Every single thing I do I try to give it a signature from OB’s.
 • I’ve done contemporary stuff too. I’ve done sashimi. And people are always a little suspect: They’ll wonder, ‘What is he doing with a pico de gallo?’ or something like that. But we’ve tried to stay contemporary.
• We always tried to be all things for all people. From the very beginning I always called it family dining. So I always tried to create an atmosphere where you could be comfortable coming in in a tank top and thongs, or you could come in here in a suit and tie and feel comfortable. No one was excluded.
• It was a pretty sleepy town when OB’s set up shop here. Highway 80 had gone in and kind of bypassed the whole town, so it became kind of sleepy. OB’s was the pioneer in [creating] a reason to come to Truckee... I think it was really a pioneer in believing that this town had a future.
• Truckee has changed a lot, but in a lot of ways it hasn’t changed. Sure there are more people now, and with more people comes a lot of change. But I think still, there’s that same spirit of Truckee that was here in the ‘70s, and that’s what makes Truckee so unique.
• [A Truckee local is] the guys who’s attracted to the town by the railroad and the mountains and the river. Who’s here because of what Truckee has to offer, as far as it’s physical beauty and stuff, and maybe not someone who’s here to see how much money he can make... I don’t think you have to be here 100 years, but I think you have to appreciate where you are and appreciate what it is for what it is.
And I think a lot of people don’t see that. They look beyond those things. But I think a true Truckee local appreciates all of it.
• Originally we were OB’s Board. And that was the menu. [Dick holds one of the original menus, which was literally glued to what looks like a weathered piece of barn siding, in his hand.] In 1978 we went from OB’s Board to OB’s Pub and Restaurant. And it’s funny because a lot of people never really could accept that. A lot of people still call us OB’s Board. I still see checks to this day, when people write checks, that say OB’s Board, and we haven’t been OB’s Board for 30 years.
• Now with the arrival of Dragonfly and Moody’s and The Lodge and all the stuff up at Northstar, we’ve become much more sophisticated than we were back in 1970 when we had corn on the cob and New York steaks.
• I’m having a hard time thinking about what I’m going to do next because I’m so emotionally tied to this place... I’m going to do something. I’m not married — I’ve been married to this place for 35 years — so what am I going to do, sit in the dark at my house? I’m going to do something. I’ll probably do something restaurant wise, but I’m not sure what.
• I’m really sad about this. When I took over in 2000, I had no ambitions other than to make this last forever. And I’ve worked seven days a week to try to make that happen, but it didn’t happen for whatever reason. So I don’t know. What do I hope for? I hope for the best. And I hope it serves Truckee well and I hope it becomes a place that people love as much as they love OB’s.
• I just want to say publicly how much I appreciate the support of the people who have supported OB’s over the years and how great it has been working with so many great people — my employees who have been so fantastic. That’s something that needs to be said. What I leave with is the support I got and how wonderful it was working with these people.
A glimmer of hope?
Long-time locals and OB’s regulars are still holding out hope that a last-minute deal might be reached to save the restaurant. By presstime we still hadn’t heard anything to lift the spirits of those saddened by the landmark restaurant’s closing, but you never know.
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Last Updated ( Tuesday, 06 May 2008 )
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