It was called the 101 because it was located at 101 Downey Avenue, the lot at Firestone Boulevard that the Cardono Building now occupies.
Old-timers will always remember the old bar’s odor of stale beer and its shining steel bar rail.
After the old bar’s last gasp at the end of the roaring 1940s, it became a clothing store. Later, in 1986, the old building was torn down.
It was in 1949 the old bar’s most infamous moment occurred when the bartender shot a bad-mouthed customer dead. "I am the one who shot that man lying on the floor," bartender Edgar Gray told the deputy sheriff when he arrived. It was widely quoted in the papers.
On further questioning, the deputy said Gray told him he shot the customer because the man had repeatedly cursed him.
Old-timers nodded when they heard the explanation. It was right out of the Old West, and it fit the bar’s aura, even to the Western painting of "The Night Watch" that hung on the wall.
Art Morris of Morris Photography remembers the 101, but said he was never inside. "It was an eyesore to the community, sitting there on the main corner of town," said Morris. "There were a lot of drunks, and people would just hang out there."
Morris said the café across the street was better and cleaner. In earlier years the old town marshal’s office was just up Downey Avenue next to where Johnnie’s Salon is today.
That was convenient, Morris said, because the marshal had to make many trips to cool down the rowdies at the old 101.
It was so seedy the nice girls in town wouldn’t be seen there. And there was almost constant trouble.
It was a basic saloon, seedy, but apparently oozing a certain charm created largely by its customers. There is nothing like it today in Downey, and for that the police are thankful.
But some very well known folks once drank there, although most of them and their families hope it has been forgotten by now.
John Vincent of the Downey Historical Society has restored the old painting from the 101’s wall, "The Night Watch." And John could probably tell you the names of some of the old customers, if you beg him.