Fox 21 reports the Main Club, Superior’s first openly gay bar, is closing after 34 years in business. Owner Bob Jansen told reporter Joey Nelson his last day of business will be shortly after the Duluth-Superior Pride Festival, which concludes with a drag show at the Main on Sept. 3.
Jansen said the bar has struggled in recent years because younger people feel less of a need for gay-specific bars.
“The younger crowd can go anywhere,” he told Fox 21. “So their support for some of the gay communities — institutions — have fallen by the wayside.”
The Main Club opened in 1983 at 1813 N. Third St. near two bars that still operate on that stretch — Lost in the ’50s and the Cedar Lounge. The building was destroyed by fire on Dec. 27, 1996. Two men in an upstairs apartment were killed; the cause of the fire was never determined.
Six months after the fire, Jansen reopened the Main at the former location of Popeye’s Bar, 1217 Tower Ave., next to the Androy Hotel.
