
As told to me by a gentleman of high standing in a local hostelry a couple of weeks ago…
McDaids Bar has always done a brisk passing trade, being off one of Dublins busiest streets, while at the same time maintaining it’s regular and staunchly loyal customer base. Now, this story is set in the late fifties/ early sixties, and Ireland at that time was not awash with cash, and this regular and staunchly customer base was not shy of asking for a couple of half ones to be “put on the tab,” or of looking for a way to cadge a pint or two.
On an Easter Monday, sometime around the turn of the sixties, the owner of the bar decided to take himself and some close allies on a trip to the races, leaving the bar in the not so capable hands of a new, young (and very naïve) barman. Away he went on his jolly way, and not long after he was gone, one of the locals (who, as the story goes, was a notoriously nice man, but a terrible one for not having two shillings to rub together,) spotted his chance for a day on the gargle. A carpenter by trade, he still had his toolbelt on him when he came in the door. Up to the bar he went and asked the barman for a pint of plain and a Créme De Menthe. The barman, only in the job a couple of weeks, looked nervously around him before saying, “I don’t think we have that sir.” “Oh, sure of course ye do. The boss keeps it down in the cellar; to keep it cool.” The barman looked around him undecidedly but deciding rather than face the wrath of the boss for annoying a regular customer, took the chance, swung open the cellar door and darted down the ladder. Not wasting any time, the carpenter hopped the counter, slammed the door shut and drove several six inch nails into it, fastening it shut and promptly started dishing out the scoops.
Needless to say, word travelled fast that McDaids were having an unwitting free bar and the place very quickly filled up with Dublin’s finest. Whiskey and Porter were being thrown across the counter at a ferocious pace, with little to be seen of money passing the other way. Of course, our carpenter friend drank his fill and promptly scarpered…
So, after a grand day at the races, a few shillings up and all the happier for it, the landlord turned off Grafton Street and started up Harry Street, towards where his pub was, and still is, situated. He was only too delighted to see the place full to the gills, people staggering around outside and inside. I’m sure he thought all his dreams had come true… Until he got inside… And recognised none of the people behind the bar. With a roar, he made his way through the fast-emptying pub and got the strangers out from behind the taps. With the pub now empty at this stage, he noticed the cellar door crudely nailed shut, and heard the feeble knocks that emanated from within. He took a jemmy bar to it and managed, after a time, to prise it open. Upon opening it, a very dazed and anxious looking barman hauled himself out of the hatch and asked “No Créme De Menthe then?”
As with all Dublin stories, I’m sure this one has sprouted legs but sure who gives a toss. These stories are the ones that will soon disappear unless we tell them, and keep re-telling them…
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