Local icon faces wrecking ball

For those fun nights on the lake, that refreshing ice cream cone, burger or soda after a special occasion at the Pavilion or big game at Bill's Field of Dreams, or a treat after Bible study at the camp up the hill, there was always the Red Willow Café.

The small yellow building near the eastern shores of Red Willow Lake served cabin tenants and customers from throughout the region for so long, it's hard to imagine the Resort without it.

After two years of inactivity, the building is slated to be torn down sometime this fall, and with it comes the end of an era that began 107 years ago at the lake six miles north and two miles west of Binford just off Highway 1.

Kitchen Equipment from the Café will be sold at auction Sunday, September 29, at 1 p.m. Ron Halvorson will be conducting the sale.

History of the Café/Red Willow Resort

From the time the first cabin was built on Red Willow Lake in 1901 and later expanding to over 90 lots – the area has been a popular recreational hotspot.

The building that housed the Red Willow Café was constructed in 1917 during the tenure of Maynard Crane and Robert Cowen's ownership of the resort, with three counters for hungry customers' dining convenience.

At that time, Red Willow was already an established destination for events. In fact, former three-time Democratic presidential candidate William Jennings Bryan gave a 1918 speech at a platform located between the original café building and where the Pavilion stands now.

The restaurant's existence predates the Pavilion by seven years, which was finished in 1924 after a five-year construction process at a cost of $5,000 during the resort's management by Fred G. Lewis. Lewis would later be succeeded by Cowen's son, Theodore, in 1929.

Seventeen years later, Kansas native William H. "Bill" Haines II, and his wife, Vernis (Hoveskeland) Haines from rural Hamar, purchased the resort from the Crane and Cowen families on August 9, 1946.

The two got acquainted in California during World War II when Bill was a pilot and Vernis was "Rosie the Riveter, for lack of a better term," according to their youngest son, Jack Haines.

"They first met at the L.A. Palladium," said Jack. "Glenn Miller was the performer, and he ended up being their first band that they had [at Red Willow]."

Jack, who still lives at Red Willow with his wife, Lisa, recalls his family's faithful years of stewardship.

"I guess some of my fondest memories are that I just learned how to work," he said. "Every part of growing up there, the tons of friends we made, and the contacts we made throughout the state and country."

Being a part of the seven-member Haines clan, along with his older siblings, Penny, Patty, Bob and William III (Billy), there was always something to do.

"It was 18 hours a day, seven days a week, and at the same time, we had cattle and bison," said Jack. "We definitely looked forward to Labor Day, when everything closed, but it was also very sad because the public was going away for the year."

The Haines family expanded the restaurant over the years, building a total of four additions.

The Café, known in its earlier years as "The Gathering Place," provided a welcome culinary companion to events at the Pavilion, where Bill and Vernis booked big bandleaders such as Sammy Kaye, Tommy and Jimmy Dorsey, Glenn Miller, and Woody Herman, among other luminaries.

A trip to Chicago the Haines's took with Rainbow Gardens owners Claire and Delores Ihringer for the National Ballroom Operators Convention in 1954 sparked their love of the budding musical genre known as rock and roll, when they heard Bill Haley and the Comets perform the classic "Rock Around the Clock."

Teens flocked to the small lake on the rolling east central North Dakota prairie to hear big names like Bobby Vee, Sam the Sham and The Pharaohs, The Beach Boys, Fats Domino, Chubby Checker, The Supremes, The Grass Roots, and Chicago, and later even New Age artist Yanni was among those to perform.

"My parents were big fans of teenagers, and people in general," Jack recalled. "There was a sign over the door at the Pavilion which said, ' Through these doors pass the greatest teenagers in the world.' They saw and brought out the positive side in people, especially younger people."

He added that Bill and Vernis didn't book their talent with money in mind, which he says would have changed the wholesome, accessible feel of Red Willow.

"Chubby Checker and Sammy Kaye would stay here for a week and a half, sometimes just for the reclusiveness of it," he said.

Rainbow Gardens would contribute to the entertainment at Red Willow when they brought a traveling roller skating show from Carrington to the Pavilion, in which Jack's sisters, Penny and Patty, played a part.

When they first bought the resort, Jack noted, there was no running water, refrigeration or electricity to the restaurant, and his parents would haul water for the resort's everyday operation.

In fact, plumbing was not installed until 1952, the same year that the Rural Electrification Administration (REA) provided for power to the lake properties. Two years later, the 1916 ice house to the west side of the restaurant building was rendered obsolete by modern freezer technology.

"I was in the ice house the other day, reading the signs up above on how many tons of ice they had to haul," said Jack.

One of Bill's other passions was baseball, and he cleared the land behind the Pavilion for a diamond which began play in 1952, later dubbed "Bill's Field of Dreams", and added "Heifer Stadium" several years later, so named for its previous life as cattle and bison-grazing ground.

He was instrumental in the creation of the first Babe Ruth Baseball league in the state in 1958, and Red Willow became the de facto youth baseball capital of North Dakota by hosting nine state tournaments. The 1968 13- and 15-year old teams, featuring all-star players from Griggs, Nelson and Steele counties, each won the state championship.

Women's softball was also popular beginning in the early 1950s, as was the pioneering concept of co-ed softball, both of which began at the resort.

At one time, an average of nearly 900 games were played at Red Willow during the summertime.

After 51 years of co-ownership, Bill passed away in 1997, leaving Vernis as the sole owner of Red Willow Resort. She would continue to be involved with day-to-day operations for a total of 69 years until she retired in 2014 at the age of 92, and died in September 2015. A cross on a hill overlooking the lake was erected in her honor in 2013.

The Café would open under new management in May 2015 when Michael Lund and Esther Donohue took over, and continued until 2018 when Lund opened Sportsmans Bar and Grill in Tolna. Donohue would later start a food truck business, Sweet Prairie.

It then underwent a quick succession of managerial changes, as Terry Bullis operated the business as Bullis Red Willow Café in 2019. Heather Barker then assumed the leadership role in 2020, and Midnight Munchies, owned and operated by Anthony Waswick, relocated from New Rockford to the café in 2021.

The Red Willow Resort's Facebook page announced on May 1, 2022, that the café would not be opening that summer, and the building has remained closed since that time.

"Due to some significant changes that need to be made to the cafe, the decision to not open it for service this summer has been made," representatives from the RWR Cabin Owner's Association said in the post. "Thanks for your understanding of this decision as we ponder how to best resolve some of the things that need to be fixed with the restaurant."

"It's just kind of that way all over in small towns right now," Jack said, regarding the attempts to find committed individuals for the restaurant business.

The transition from the concept of the sit-down restaurant has gradually changed to a more portable option, as food trucks have become the newest delivery method for resort visitors in the last few years.

"The association, to retain some of the community atmosphere, brings the trucks in just to kind of keep the vibe going," Jack said.

For Jack and many of the visitors to Red Willow over his family's long tenure of ownership, the decision to demolish the café is a tough and heartrending one for all those with sentimental attachment to the resort.

He admitted it was probably the restaurant's time to go, but concluded, "I certainly won't be here when it goes down."

(Editor's Note: In the print edition of this story, it was erroneously reported that Halvorson Boote Auction was in charge of the equipment sale. Ron Halvorson is conducting the sale independently as a favor to the Cabin Owners' Association in order to sell some of the excess kitchen items and building decor in the café. The Independent regrets the error.)