Lariat Cafe Then and Now

619 Third Avenue – Dodge City, Kansas

Among the properties Edwin and Annie Acker owned was a five-room house at the southwest corner of Third Avenue and Spruce Street. Edwin served with Ford County Attorney Mike Sutton during the Civil War. In March of 1900, Edwin’s mind “gave out” and he was shipped off to the asylum in Osawatomie after being adjudged insane. He died a few weeks later at the age of 78.

Annie received Edwin’s survivor pension and took in boarders for extra money. She suffered a paralytic stroke in 1917 and died at the home of a friend in May of 1918 at the age of 80. That October, the Square Deal Cleaning and Pressing Parlor opened in the former Acker home.

Brothers Rolland and Jesse Barker acquired the property in the Summer of 1919 and arranged for the home to be removed from the lot.

They constructed a new frame building with frontage on Third and Spruce for the Barker Brothers Cabinet Shop.

The cabinet shop was relocated a couple blocks north by 1930. By 1932, the building had been extended west along Spruce and may have been bricked at that time. It was occupied by a bakery, possibly the Sno-White, with a large oven in the rear.

Refrigeration Equipment Co. used the building for a short time in the 1940s followed by Schafer’s Cafe.

Schafer’s Cafe moved to 403 Second Avenue around 1946 and was replaced by Bill and Ruth Hill’s Lariat Cafe.

Bill was in poor health and was advised by his physician to sell the business in 1950 but the 73-seat cafe was profitable and he held onto it for several more years.

The Kline Dairy float is shown in front of Murphy Radio & Television and Lariat Cafe during the 1955 Boot Hill Fiesta parade.

This photo with the T. M. Deal lumber yard in the background was taken during the 1956 Boot Hill Fiesta.

Around 1959, Nolan Howard began operating the Lariat followed by Mrs. Floan Skinner. Victor Kisner had acquired the business by 1961, which was renamed Vic’s Lariat Cafe.

In February of 1961, word spread over the Associated Press wire that the City Commission had tentatively approved plans for a new parking lot along the west side of Third Avenue between what is now called Front Street and Spruce. By that time, the old Anawalt-Campbell Lumber Co. facility was vacant so only the buildings north of Walnut Street presented roadblocks. Kisner advertised the business for sale in the Summer of 1962.

In January of 1964, Boot Hill Museum announced an upcoming expansion of the Front Street Replica. This project was made possible by the closure of Fourth Avenue between Wyatt Earp and Spruce and demolition of the structures on the west side of Third Avenue. This is the view from First National Bank in 1965.

This is how the former site of Lariat Cafe looks today:

This parking lot has been steadily decaying for decades. Some of the parking stops have crumbled into pieces the size of snowballs. The metal railing going up the hill is rusted and falling apart. Those stairs have been closed off for ages. It’s an absolute hazard. Hopefully, this will be addressed during the streetscape project expansion to Spruce because the lot’s current condition is not what you want visitors to see adjacent to your flagship attraction.

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