By DAVID DUPONT
BG Independent Newss
On Dec 3, 2020, Danny Sellers didn’t feel well. Could this be a stroke? Sellers who lives alone in Rudolph decided to try to sleep it off. An hour of sleep didn’t help.
It was a stroke. He doesn’t know why he didn’t call for help at first. His therapist said that’s common for people who live alone and who have never had a stroke.
“If I’d called right away, I’d be better off,” Sellers said.
What he knows is that his life has changed. Even the simplest chores like opening a jar are difficult without the use of his left arm.
“I kind of see it as a new stage of life,” he said recently. “I wish it hadn’t happened. But there’s nothing to be done about it.”
For over 40 years, Sellers worked as a bartender at Howard’s Club H in downtown Bowling Green. It was a job he loved, but it didn’t have benefits.
Medicare and Medicaid, which was a struggle to get, cover most of his medical costs. He receives Social Security. But that doesn’t cover all the other expenses required to make his home accessible and to help him continue living on his own.
He loves to cook, he said, but that means finding devices he can use one handed. They may not be expensive, $30 to $40, but that adds up.
So Howard’s is hosting a benefit to help with those expenses on Sunday (June 26) 3-8 p.m. Music will start at 4 p.m.
Bands playing will be Ginger and the Snaps, the Joe Baker Band, Corduroy Road, and Michael Katon.
Owner Steve Feehan has started a GoFundMe page for those who can’t attend the benefit
There will be raffles and food trucks in the parking lot. Donation at the door is $5.
Sellers, 72, is a graduate of Avon Lake High School. He came to Bowling Green to study political science. He never graduated. He ended up working in a local factory and he’d stop at Howard’s after work. When he was 28 or 29 – he doesn’t remember precisely – there was an opening for a bartender. He hated factory work, so he applied.
At the time, he didn’t expect this would be his career. He didn’t expect it to last six months. But he found bartending suited him.
“I am a private person, but that doesn’t mean I don’t like seeing people,” he said. “That was my entertainment in many ways.”
Still “at other times it’s a job, a job with a capital J-O-B,” Sellers said. It’s no fun trying to control some people when they’ve had too much to drink. “That was a small minority of people. The majority of customers over the years were wonderful people.”
The bar is a BG institution. He knew most the of customers. Half the time he worked days, half the time he worked nights. Days tended to be quieter. He knew most of those customers. Mostly townies.
Nights were louder with the live music cranked up.
“I heard a lot of very, very good bands, and a lot of horrible bands There’s been so many good bands. It’s hard to remember them all.”
Michael Katon, the blues-rock guitar virtuoso from Hell, Michigan, is a favorite. Katon will come down on Sunday to close out the show.
Sellers also enjoyed the annual Welders reunions over spring break. Joe Baker and his band mates were key members of the group.
Tips were better at night. Over the years, he said, he was financially secure except for not having benefits.
The faces of customers may have changed, but the essential nature of people doesn’t.
Howard’s hasn’t changed much over the years. “It’s always been a music venue,” he said.
“We never catered to any one group. We’ll take anyone,” Sellers said.
He remembers back when the drinking age was 18, sororities would descend on the place, one, two, even three at a time.
Howard’s also developed a reputation as a biker bar. People just called it that because they’d see the motorcycle lined up outside. Some people may have been scared away by that, but the bikers were just good customers to Sellers.
Howard’s, which stays open every day of the year including Christmas, draws in locals home for the holidays.
He recalled one holiday night – he’s not sure which holiday – when he had two sisters sitting on the south side of the bar. Sellers knew them. They told him “we just had to get away from our parents.”
He responded: So your folks are at home?
“No, they’re on the other side.” He laughed. “That sums up Howard’s.”
He’s served a couple generations of drinkers.
Sellers likes the upgrades that Feehan has made, especially on the band side.
“It’s still a dive bar,” Sellers said “There’s nothing wrong with a dive bar. A dive bar can be a good place or a bad place. Howard’s is a good place.”
Danny Sellers is one of those people who made it that way, and on Sunday its customers will have the chance to return the favor.
