One of my favorite East Coast bike bars of all-time, the Sawmill Tavern in Schenectady, New York, serves it's final Sunday free brunch.
After spending the past 1,500 or so Sundays making sure he had enough food to give a lot of people a free, hot meal, Don Birch took a Sunday off — a casualty of the same hard times he tried to make easier for others.
The longtime owner of the Sawmill Tavern served up what he said was the last of the free buffets he has offered every Sunday afternoon since 1980, two years after opening his biker bar in the Little Italy neighborhood in this economically depressed city on New York's Mohawk River.
Anyone who needed a meal — the homeless, the unemployed, the elderly, whole families struggling to make ends meet — could show up at the Sawmill Tavern on the corner of South Avenue and North Jay Street no questions asked.
As Schenectady's economy worsened, the number of people who showed up each Sunday rose to about 200. Birch says he can no longer afford to pay for the free meals out of his own pocket, even with food donations from local businesses and a farmer who provided potato's. He lost his job as an assistant plant manager at a locomotive factory when it shuttered two years ago amid a cratering economy and rising unemployment. A typical Sunday spread featured chicken, ribs, meatloaf or spaghetti and meatballs, vegetables and mashed potato's.
For the final meal, Birch served prime rib to about 180 people that showed up despite a cold, steady rain.
If you're ever in Schenectady, on a bike or not, make time to down a few at the Sawmill.
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