As the Players’ Retreat turns 69, its owner vows that beloved bar will be here forever
The Players’ Retreat itself is a kind of time machine, packed with N.C. State and Raleigh nostalgia and the countless memories of watching a city grow up around it.
For its birthday party, the famed Raleigh bar is taking diners back to the beginning, charging the same 1951 prices for hot dogs and Budweisers as when the Players’ Retreat first opened.
The party will be Monday, Feb. 24, celebrating the Players’ Retreat’s 69th birthday. Hot dogs are a quarter, Budweisers are 35 cents.
“It’s just a crazy idea we got in our heads,” said PR owner Gus Gusler. “Let’s celebrate the fact that the place is still here.”
Situated near Hillsborough Street, across the road from NC State, the Players’ Retreat is Raleigh’s most famous bar. It was founded by Bernie and Mickey Hanula and developed generations of faithful regulars. Gusler, a Raleigh attorney who worked at the PR in college, bought the bar in 2005 when it had fallen on harder times, largely just so it wouldn’t close.
“I just didn’t want to see it go away,” Gusler said. “I had no interest in running a restaurant and bar, I just worked in kitchens to pay my way through school. It was a bit of a shock, but I just couldn’t handle the idea of it closing.”
This isn’t the first time the PR has offered pocket change deals for its birthday. Last year, Gusler said, the PR went through 1,600 hot dogs and 18 kegs of Budweiser.
Raleigh landmark
In its history, the PR has been the epicenter of political campaigns, fed writers and judges and hosted countless N.C. State games, originally on 19 inch tube TVs and now on flat screens.
“It’s got a lot of history,” Gusler said. “It like a Southern, Scottish or Irish pub in a small town. Just a bar where people feel comfortable.”
But the PR isn’t just a place holding the stories of the past, it’s still creating Raleigh lore. There’s some disagreement over exactly where Ashley Christensen and Kait Goalen got engaged. It was either Booth 6 or Booth 7, but Gusler said the PR has found a way to settle it.
“We’re going to hang a picture in between the booths,” he said. Christensen, the James Beard-winning chef of Poole’s diner and other Raleigh restaurants, is a PR regular and is enshrined in its hall of fame. She and AC-Restaurants executive director Goalen were married last summer, in a local wedding that was recently profiled in Vogue Magazine.
PR forever
Years of development pressure have threatened the long-term future of the Players’ Retreat. The Hillsborough Street corridor is redeveloping, adding restaurants, apartments and hotels in recent years, with more changes looming. There are five years left on the PR lease, but Gusler feels confident the bar will survive for decades.
“We have a great landlord, he’s a dear friend of mine,” Gusler said of building owner Thomas Carter, who owns the Oberlin Road block and several other adjacent parcels. “He loves the PR as much as I do. We talk on a regular basis. We’re going to figure this out between us. We haven’t done a new lease, but it’s going to happen.
“The PR is going to be there forever.”
This story was originally published February 10, 2020 at 11:14 AM.
