Jackie O’s Pub & Brewery took less damage than some of the businesses uptown, but despite setbacks, it looks to continue expansion.
Customers might not realize it, but Jackie O’s Pub & Brewery, 24 W. Union St., has some deep family roots for owner Art Oestrike. From the name of the establishment to the title of one of the most popular brews, his business pays homage to those in his life.
Oestrike purchased the BrewPub in 2005 — originally called O’Hooleys. He wanted to expand his ventures beyond co-owning Bagel Street Deli, 27 S. Court St., which he still owns.
The building was built somewhere between 1950 and 1954 and previously housed businesses such as Townhouse Restaurant-Poolroom in 1981, Peters Papers in 1942 and Fouch’s Bakery in 1912.
Art changed the business’ name in 2007 after his mother, Jackie Oestrike, died from lung cancer.
In 2009, he purchased the adjoining building to the bar, Skippers, and renamed it the Public House. Before Skippers, it was home to The Graduate and before that, home to a number of bars as early as 1915.
The kitchen was opened by the end of 2009.
“Our lunch crowd, dinner crowd was amazing. It was a staple,” said Jonathan Holmberg, a bartender at Jackie O’s and a long-time Athens resident.
When the fire hit
Holmberg was in Columbus over the weekend during the course of the fire and is still trying to grasp what happened.
“It’s going to be a long time before some of those people see paychecks again,” he said. “It’ll be hard to make up that kind of income and replace those jobs right away. … I have other ways of getting by but some of these other kids have nothing else.
"It’s going to take a community effort to help some of these people.”
The Jackie O’s name extends in Athens beyond the Union Street location. Jackie O’s Barrel Ridge Farm, located in Lodi Township, and the Taproom and Brewery, 25 Campbell St., were both acquired in 2011. The farm supplements both the brews and the food produced for the business. The taproom allowed the business to begin packaging beers into kegs and canning certain brews.
Jackie O’s beer can be found in over 1,200 bars and retailers in Ohio — sold draft or retail.
One of these brews is particularly special to the Oestrike family — Chomolungma.
The name in Tibetan means “Everest.” At Jackie O’s, it’s a customer-favorite, honey-brown ale.
Oestrike’s brother, Brian, climbed to the top of Chomolungma, the tallest mountain on earth, in the Himalayas, in 2007. It’s a feat only 4,000 have completed. He dedicated this summit to their mother and raised money for LUNGevity, a foundation funding research for lung cancer.
“We brewed this honey-nut brown to celebrate the summit and we liked it so much we continued to brew it,” said Brad Clark, head brewer at Jackie O’s, who originally worked at O’Hooley’s.
The first batch brewed as Jackie O’s was Ohio Pale Ale on June 10, 2006 — and was also Clark’s first batch as the brewer.
“It was a couple of days after I graduated that we brewed that first batch,” he said. “We never planned on it getting this big.”
The drinks produced at the BrewPub location are mainly served at Jackie O’s uptown location. The Campbell Street location produces the products that are sold to outside sources. At the BrewPub, 25 to 30 kegs are produced each week, and 400 kegs per week are made at the main brewery.
None of the equipment at the BrewPub had damage from the fire.
{{tncms-asset app="editorial" id="55115d66-6ec7-11e4-bcd3-5b64a57577b9"}}
Looking ahead
The BrewPub side of Jackie O’s reopened Wednesday at 5 p.m. with a cash-only bar. While the full kitchen won’t reopen for a while, the bakery will temporarily operate out of The Appalachian Center for Economic Networks, 94 Columbus Road.
The brewery is also planning on setting up a small kitchen in the BrewPub area so soup in bread bowls and more can be served.
Jackie O’s plans to open a full bakery at the Taproom location where all the baking will be done. Clark said they’ll be getting ready to break ground at the end of the year on a 7,000 square foot build out of the Campbell St. location.
“We feel like we’re slightly visible because we’re out and about. It shows continuity and that we’re still fighting,” said June Bug, head of the bakery at Jackie O’s. “It’s been really nice to see how supportive everybody is in the community. It’s sad, but it’s kind of beautiful, too.”
To try and keep some of his employees and to keep serving Athens with Jackie O’s food, Oestrike is researching with city if it would allow a food truck either in front of or in the alley by the business.
“To see the scale of the fire and the fact that they were able to keep that block from being devastated, as a community we should all be grateful. It’s an old wooden town with all the buildings connected,” Holmberg said. “We’re going to put everything back to the way it was or better.”
@kruseco
sk139011@ohio.edu
