The Paczki Principle
Rich, creamy blueberry scent
Guaranteed to make you hungry!
Detroit's famed Soup Kitchen Saloon closed in 1999, the victim of a controversial casino riverfront plan. Thought to have been the oldest bar in the city, the Soup Kitchen had been home to a roster of legendary names in music, both local and national, since its rebirth as Detroit's Home of the Blues in 1974.
A bar had been in operation at the corner of Franklin and Orleans at least since the 1850s, and the cozily dark dining room and bar area of the Soup Kitchen dated back to 1883. It was a friendly tavern for sailors debarked from ships that plied the once-busy Detroit River, and was popular with workers from the small industrial workshops in the area. Brian McDonald bought the rundown place in 1974, determined to make it the city's top blues venue. He was also a visionary, for Detroit was in rather dismal shape at the time, and many places were going under. But McDonald's idea clicked, and the Soup Kitchen began to draw an integrated crowd at a time when many suburbanites feared to venture into the city.
The Soup Kitchen hosted nationally renowned acts like John Lee Hooker and Mose Allison, and its Tuesday-night open-jam sessions were legendary among the local music elite. Despite the bar's success, it was not without its share of nearby trouble, including a notorious 1979 slaying of a Grosse Pointe promoter linked to drug-dealing. Still, the Soup Kitchen helped make what became known as the Warehouse District a thriving entertainment hub by the early 1990s, with several bars and restaurants doing excellent and trouble-free business.
That era ended in 1998, when Detroit Mayor Dennis Archer strong-armed local business owners like McDonald into shuttering their flourishing establishments to make way for a riverfront casino scheme that ultimately went nowhere. McDonald supported the idea, believing that any influx would serve the city's ultimate good, and auctioned off the Soup Kitchen's historic bar that served so many for so long.
Abandoned, and after several fires, the Soup Kitchen Saloon was demolished in 2006.
