Pair-a-Dice Lost

The still fresh scent of last week's fire lingers in the air of Paradise. The devastating flames eliminated one -third of the town's businesses and left a gaping hole on the edge of the community. Although the Pair-A-Dice bar and grill is in ruins its memories are still rumbling fiercely throughout the town.

Marie Barber played her first dance when she was 14 at the Pair-A-Dice back in 1952.

"And the building was old then," Barber said.

She and her band, the Big Sky Drifters played several times throughout the years, hosting dances.

"We played every Saturday night for a long time," Barber reminisced, "We had huge crowds, it was a lively place but that was back in the '70s."

She and her husband, Rod Barber, and Ken Ray made up the band back then and Barber remembers Burt Loftus playing the banjo for jam sessions at the bar as well. The Big Sky Drifters were the house band and hosted a lot of jam sessions. They helped cook and bring in fiddler jamborees for the owners at the time, Ada and Marion Schmoyer.

"We were up at the Cow's Bell when my kids were in grade school," Barber shared, "and Rod was up at a little bar and everybody there thought he was Charlie Rich, so they were all buying him drinks and asking were he was playing that night and he's say the Pair-A-Dice. Then I walked in and said, 'Hey Rod you ready to go?' That really burst his bubble."

Barber said that she hasn't played at the bar for years and only plays piano for the church now.

Barbers' band brought in The Plainsmen from Thompson Falls. She remembers them specifically because the drummer made his voice sound like a saxophone. Other local bands played as well but one memory Barber said a lot of people might share was Burt Kelly riding his horse right through the door and up to the bar!

"We used to have some hay days," Barber laughed, " A lot of good times were had there and a lot of memories, it's just really sad that it happened. It's a very tragic thing."

Audrey Knapp and her sister Wanda Copp agreed that they had a lot of great times and memories at the Pair-A-Dice as well.

"My sister and brother in law were going to buy it and they were always rolling dice so I said that's what it should be named," Copp said.

Audrey Knapp and her husband bought the bar in 1965. They put the business in her mother's name because at the time you had to have lived in the state for a year. They owned the place until 1968 when they went back to Alaska.

"We like to dance throughout the year," Knapp said. "There were a lot of good times."

Betty Meyers of Paradise remembers dancing there back in high school. She also said that reason the bar was slightly out of town at the time was because of the railroad.

"The railroad owned the town so each deed said that no spirits could be sold and no prostitution," Meyers laughed.

Meyers added that Joe Sheppard's grandfather built the building that the Whistlestop Cafe is now occupying but after they finished it, the railroad said no alcohol could be sold so they just bought he property outside of town and built it there.

According to Sheppard his grandfather, Ed Hazelton, built it in the forties for Lyman Miller.

"When the Sheehan's owned it, it was a guaranteed good time," Sheppard remember, "They had music every Friday and Saturday night, after that the entertainment wasn't on a schedule."

Sheppard also happens to be the assistant fire chief for the Plains department and was called to the scene last Friday morning.

"We got there simultaneously with the rural department and hooked up to the hydrant," Sheppard said, "but the flames were still 20 feet or so. With no people in there it was almost like a stand-back-and-watch kind of thing, there was no real reason to risk the firefighters."

Kathy Miller, daughter of the original owner Lyman Miller, said that it was built in 1937 give or take a year.

"It was called Millers' bar for years but people affectionately referred to it as the Green Shingle," Miller explained that the entire building donned green shingles as siding.

Her father owned the business for about thirty years before he sold it in 1965.

"I remember a lot of the people that came in," Miller said after finally being allowed to wait tables and tend bar on New Year's eve after coming of legal drinking age. "It used to be quite a gathering place, it's a landmark and it's been there for a long time even though it's changed hands and configurations many times."

Miller said that people still identify her with Lyman and Millers' bar even though several others have owned it throughout the years.

Leo Rambur remembers the troop trains that used to come through Paradise. Lyman Miller was called to service and Rambur's father in law, Bruno, owned the Mint Bar in Plains at the time. For the two years that Miller was in service, Bruno ran the bar to keep it going.

"The troop trains would stop to change crew," Rambur said, "When the train pulled in the troops would run across the lot to the Green Shingle. He had the drinks and shots all ready. The crews would run in, line'em up, pay their dollar and go out the back door and get back to the train again. My father-in-law saved all those dollars in a can and one day had me take him into Missoula and he bought a big blue super Buick for $1,900 with the money he made. So just about any soldier that went to the west coast stopped there in Paradise!"

Miller took the bar back when he got home from service and according to Rambur played piano and took flying lessons.

"He was quite a go getter back then," Rambur said about Miller.

He spent some time reminiscing about what it was like to be young back then too.

"There was no music after 12 p.m. in Plains back then due to city ordinance and no drinks after one," Rambur said, "So we would load up the cars and have a couple drinks at the Green Shingle then go across to the Beanery and have big steaks…we would get home at about four or five in the morning. We worked hard and played hard, it was a good time…it was a lot different then it is today."