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|  | Opinion Letter from the Editor Deerhunter Provided Cherished Memories  by Brandon Burt By the time I started sneaking into bars, the Deerhunter was already an institution in Salt Lake’s gay community. Back in those days it was the closest thing we had to a Levi/leather club. At age 19 I would present my fake I.D. — which, to tell the truth, was as convincing as the GOP’s recent pretense at inclusiveness — and somehow the doorman would let me in.
Most nights, having successfully negotiated the tight squeeze up to the bar, I would be greeted by a handsome, jovial, bearded man. I’d plonk down my dough for a dollar draft and, as he gave me my change, Steve Baxter would briskly tap the bar twice — a friendly, trademark gesture — and say, “Thanks, buddy!”
I don’t think he ever learned my name. But it was enough for me, at that tender age, to be his “buddy.”
Eventually I turned 21, and, as it turned out, half of Salt Lake’s gay male community was Steve’s buddy. But somehow he always made each of his customers feel special, and whatever profits he made — on the narrow margin that any bar business earns — he invested back into the business.
City Cab dispatchers, with cynical wit, would call it “Bambi’s.” It had a reputation for attracting a somewhat more butch clientele than many straight people were willing to associate with a gay bar in those days. To begin with, it was a quirky and somewhat cramped place — just a bar and a tight spot with a pool table — but Steve kept expanding and adding onto it.
The game room was notorious, but then a front bar was opened, and with it enough space for multiple pool tables. Tournaments started up. The summer the patio appeared, with its quaking aspen and ponderosa pine, was glorious.
The Wasatch Leathermen Motorcycle Club adopted it as their home bar, and would regularly hold fundraising beer busts. Steve himself would offer weekly two-for-one specials, and in odd compliance with DABC regulations, would present customers with a “wooden nickel” — a pine slug exchangeable for a draft beer — with each purchase. Only last week I was going through a box and came across a few of those beer tokens.
One of my fondest memories was the night I was blindfolded, handcuffed, and carried bodily out of the Deerhunter by the WLMC. My pledge period was finally over and it was time for the big initiation. When I, along with the rest of my new club brothers, returned, I was a changed person. Suddenly, I was part of something larger than myself — something that often freaked out a lot of other people. In some ways that was the best part — the shock value — but, no matter how far we went with our raucous, somewhat perverse fun, Steve always made us feel our presence was valued. In some ways we were the floorshow, and on the bright side, nobody ever lost an eye.
For many of the Deerhunter’s customers, the beginning of the end came with the addition of the dance floor. A friend of mine, John Martin, mainly objected to the inclusion of a Confederate flag along with all the other banners hanging from the ceiling. (After complaints were met with little response, John’s plan to get rid of the flag was to bring a bullhorn and begin to agitate the crowd against racism. During the ensuing brouhaha, another friend would just “happen by” carrying a gas can. John would run into the bar, tear down the flag, grab the gas can and engage in an “impromptu” flag burning. For better or worse, this bit of street theater never actually took place.)
For the rest of us, however, the dance floor simply changed the dynamic of the bar. It brought with it a flood of people we would derisively refer to as “the Sun crowd” — twinks, sweater queens. I’m pretty sure now they were not much different from the rest of us, but at the time it marked a distinct change in the Deerhunter’s clientele.
After the Sun blew down during a freak tornado, the change was complete — the Deerhunter would never be the same.
Later, the Deerhunter itself burned down and Club Blue was closed by the DABC Gestapo. It was a bad period for gay clubs in Salt Lake City.
There’s more to life than going to the bar, of course. But Steve Baxter provided a comfortable, friendly place for us to meet, and without him, Salt Lake’s gay community wouldn’t have been the same.
And for that, all I can say is, “Thanks, buddy.” | | |
