#5376 - Rudy's Tavern, East Stroudsburg, PA - 9/4/23

Rudy's Tavern, East Stroudsburg, PA

It's said that not much has changed at Rudy's Tavern since Rudy Manheim opened the joint in 1933, after obtaining one of the first Pennsylvania liquor licenses following federal prohibition. You can believe that stepping into the place. If feels warm and old -- too much of community meeting place for me to think of it as a dive bar. The web site mentions "a history that stretches back to the early 1900s," but I wasn't able to find out anything about that.

Rudy passed away in 1981, leaving the bar to his bartender and manager Denny Deardorff, apparently to the surprise of the Marine veteran. "On Super Bowl Sunday 1981, Deardorff drove his friend to the hospital. Manheim died in the night at age 84. To Deardorff's surprise, Manheim had left him the bar." (poconorecord)

Deardorff, who had served in Vietnam, ran the place until he passed away in 2015. The bar remained in Denny's family, run by his daughter Kelly and her husband Joe "Giggy" Quaresimo.

It was quiet on the Monday afternoon that we dropped in, but it's not always that way. It's said that back in the day Rudy had to cut off Jackie Gleason himself when the star broke a light swinging a golf club. More recently, in September of 2014, the staff celebrated with a group of U.S. Marshals and and Pennsylvania State Police, drinking after capturing survivalist cop killer Eric Frein. The 15-20 men where part of a force that had grown to over 1,000 people, after Frein left his parents house where he lived and fired on the state police barracks in the Pocono Mountains, killing one office and seriously wounding another, before escaping into the surrounding wilderness.

Nowadays the bar often features live bands on weekend evenings, and can totally pack the place with events like veterans benefits, and when the Edward P. Maloney Memorial Pipe Band left the Pocono Irish American Club St. Patrick's Day parade for an impromptu concert in the bar.

We had a fairly brief stop before starting back on the remaining 300 miles across the state to home.

 

Rudy's Tavern, East Stroudsburg, PA
(Print from inside the bar itself, artist unknown)

90 Washington St, East Stroudsburg, PA 18301 - (570) 424-1131
Est. 1933  
Web site: rudystavern.com - facebook - twitter - instagram 
Articles: xplorethepoconos.com - poconorecord - abcnews - yelp - tripadvisor - discovernepa