TKC Goes To Raglan Road
For a few years I went to O’Dowd’s Little Dublin on the Plaza about twice a week. Most of those nights the pub was close to empty - especially if there was Irish entertainment on.
Similarly once we got past the initial attention following its opening, WJ McBride’s Irish Pub & Restaurant in Overland Park struggled to get numbers all the way until it closed down.
Molloy’s of Westport was even less successful.
I have heard all of them described at times as tomb-like. There’s a harsh deathly sound in a pub with a hard floor and very few people. Why do pubs in Kansas City purporting to be Irish never have carpets?
Prompted by my posting of a video featuring Raglan Road, Tony of Tony’s Kansas City admitted that he recently went there with a friend after lunch one day - and he likened it to a tomb in a post he calls “Raglan Road is Irish and Depressing and Sad“:
Raglan Road at the P&L District is only slightly less depressing than the bittersweet prose of Angela’s Ashes
As a proponent of the characteristics I should probably add that I don’t think there’s anything necessarily wrong with being Irish and depressing and sad, though it does tend to shed light on the difference between the number of people in Kansas City talking about being Irish, and the number of people actually doing very much about it.
I should also add that I’ve no idea what day of the week the video was shot, nor the day of the week of Tony’s visit - but the days of the week ultimately never mattered for Molloy Brothers Irish Pub or either of the WJ McBrides pubs, while O’Dowd’s has thrived largely because of its high-fiving belly bumping non-Irish moments.
See Also:
• The Closing of WJ MCBrides and Other Irish Pubs in Kansas City
• History of a Pub, an Irish Pub
• How To Open An Irish Pub
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