Local lore in North End (Superior), Wisconsin

• The Anchor Bar started as a longshoremen's bar. Before it became the most-recommended burger in the Twin Ports, it was where the dock workers of the north end drank, and food did not arrive on the menu until the early 1980s.
• The Cedar Lounge has been a tavern since 1912, when it went up for the Northern Brewing Company along the working harbor and entertainment district. It is billed as the longest continually operating tavern in the Twin Ports.
• Earth Rider brews in a mercantile warehouse. The former Leamon Mercantile building became roughly 16,000 square feet of brewery with help from a state Community Development Investment grant.
• Thirsty Pagan brews in a railroad building. The 1908 Soo Line Freight Depot served the railroad until 1989.
• Local accounts put the neighborhood's population near 12,500 around 1910. Superior's entire population today is about 26,300, which tells you how much of this city's life used to happen in these blocks.
• The industrial buildings are the raw material. A mercantile warehouse became a brewery, a freight depot became a brewpub, and a 1912 brewery tavern became a music venue. Nothing here was built to be charming, which is precisely why it works.

Local lore next door

The rest of the guide