Happy Birthday, Hampshire House!

When I’m asked by a Bostonian where I live, I typically give one of two answers:

• Just across the street from the Make Way for Duckling statues;

or

• Cheers block, only other end.

Today is the 50th birthday of the Hampshire House, the home of Cheers.

What’s been Cheers for – yikes! – more than 35 years now, used to be a neighborhood pub called the Bull & Finch, known for its darts players. One of those darts players, although I didn’t know her at the time, was my friend V. In my twenties, I went to the Bull & Finch a few time, but don’t recall seeing a lot of women darts players, let alone a very pretty one with gorgeous auburn hair, who could really throw a dart.

While I did look in at the Bull & Finch on occasion, mostly, by the time I was in my mid-twenties, the spot in the Hampshire House – a turn of the 20th century mansion – was the bar/restaurant on the first floor.

While the Bull & Finch downstairs was singles, noise, and darts, the upstairs room was older folks and Gershwin.

What an elegant and lovely room that was. Gorgeous paneling, a view of the Boston Public Garden. It was especially pleasant to sit there looking out during a snowstorm. Pretty good food, too. (My favorite was a chicken breast in red pepper coulis. Yum.)

My husband and I, who went out to eat almost every night, ate there pretty often. Or just stopped in for a drink. We weren’t super regulars, but we were there pretty often.

There was a regular pianist, Selene, who was quite good, but who had the annoying habit – annoying at least to Jim and me – of walking around the lounge when she wasn’t playing and do “meet and greets.” (I just googled, and the write up on her death that appeared in the Boston Globe noted that she liked to “work the room.” I can’t remember why her working the room irked us so much, but it did. Anyway, Selene died at the age of 95, the year after my husband.)

Although we did see Joan Kennedy there once, the Hampshire House wasn’t a famous people scene. Mostly neighborhood types. (The evening we saw Joan, we were there with our friend Steve. Joan, who had had a few, walked over to our table, picked up Steve’s arm, looked at his watch, and then let his arm go. One way to figure out the time…)

Most of the time I spent at the Hampshire House was B.C. – Before Cheers.

Once that show took off, you couldn’t get near the downstairs pub, and the lovely first floor lounge was converted to a souvenir shop. Sigh.

(It is amazing to me that, 25+ years after the show went off the air, tourists still flock to the Cheers site.)

We went to Cheers a handful of times, mostly showing around out-of-town guests who wanted to see it. And on the day that we found out that my husband’s cancer was near terminal, we had lunch there. In the course of Jim’s illness, he was diagnosed with celiac disease, and he became very good about observing a gluten free diet. But when he found out he was a short-timer, well, to hell with that. What he really wanted was a hot dog on a hot dog roll, and we knew that the Cheers bar had pretty good hot dogs. So, we went straight from MGH to Cheers.

There are some nice function rooms in the Hampshire House – unspoiled by the nearness to Cheers - and I’ve been to a number of functions there over the years.

So, while my history with the Hampshire House is not 50 years long, it’s nearly there. And that history is a good one, packed with many memories of a lot of fun. (Even that post-MGH hot dog lunch had its moments.)

So, Happy Birthday, Hampshire House.

And Congratulations to owner Tom Kershaw, who bought it all those years back, and who lives on the top floor of what is truly his house.

Tom’s lucky day, of course, was the day the producers of Cheers walked in and decided to set their sticom there.

That lucky break brought wave after wave of tourists to what had been a successful but small neighborhood joint, and the windfall — sales of “Cheers” T-shirts and beer mugs went through the roof — gave Kershaw the financial wherewithal to open other restaurants, take important leadership roles at local and national hospitality trade groups, and become a benefactor to Boston Common, the Freedom Trail, the Beacon Hill neighborhood, and nonprofits throughout the city. (Source: The Boston Globe)

Tom Kershaw is an excellent neighbor, capably managing the hordes that have converged on his place over the years; keeping the ‘hood spruced up; paying for the Frog Pond (skating rink/splash pond) on Boston Common. (Is there are lovelier urban sight than skaters after dark on a winter’s night, especially if the Christmas lights are up?)

At the time Jim and I were regular Hampshire House goers in the late 1970’s/early 1980’s - as I said, B.C. – we were also regulars at a neighborhood Italian restaurant, The Charles, which, while plunked in the middle of ye olde quaint Brahmin Beacon Hill – was a hangout for off duty judges, on duty cops, and members of the Mafia. Quite a scene.

In the late 1990’s, Kershaw bought The Charles and converted it into a supremely wonderful neighborhood restaurant, 75 Chestnut, where Jim and I ate once a week. These days, I can’t say that I frequent it all that much, but I still manage to pop in a few times a year.

I don’t need to go to a place where everybody knows my name – or would know my name, if I’d taken Jim’s, which was Diggins: there are two places where I’m Maureen Diggins: 75 Chestnut and the dry cleaners on Charles – but it’s nice to go into 75 Chestnut and still be known if the long-time hostess is on duty.

The restaurant/pub business is notoriously a tough one, so kudos to Tom Kershaw for his success. Sure, the luck of the sitcom draw had a lot to do with it. Still, you have to give him credit for his savvy. (And thanks for his generosity to the ‘hood.)

In the Globe article, it mentions that, while today is the anniversary of Tom’s purchase of the Hampshire House, the Bull & Finch (now Cheers) opened on December 1, 1969.

So, it’ll be turning 50 on that date.

As it happens, that’s the date on which I will be turning – gulp! – 70!

Maybe I’ll stop in for lunch that day. A hot dog might hit the spot…