Palmer’s, legendary 119-year-old Minneapolis dive bar, will close in September

The nationally heralded Palmer’s Bar, one of Minneapolis’ oldest dive bars where the music is loud and the drinks are cheap, will close in September after 119 years, according to a surprise Facebook post late Wednesday night.

“It is with heavy hearts that we must finally announce that Palmer’s Bar last day of business will be this Sept. 14, 2025,” read the post from the West Bank institution, which opened in 1906. “This has been an incredibly difficult but necessary decision and we are devastated to do so.”

Once touted by Esquire magazine as one of the best bars in America, the funky joint at 500 Cedar Av. S., decorated with beer and music memorabilia, has been a hub in recent years for rootsy and local punk bands as well as the home base for indomitable Minneapolis blues/jazz piano man Cornbread Harris, 98, on Sunday evenings.

“OMG. There is no place like Palmer’s, it’s irreplaceable,” Jason McGrath said on Facebook. “Such a great mix of people in a great location. Nothing else like it.”

Talking to the Minnesota Star Tribune in May about how the nationwide trend of declining alcohol sales is hurting music venues, Palmer’s co-owner Pat Dwyer said attendance for live shows was holding strong, but bar sales were down almost 20%.

“We aren’t singing the blues at Palmer’s, because we’re still seeing strong support for the live music scene that we love and care deeply about,” Dwyer said. “But we have to figure something out.

“You look across the room and can still see a full house, but the bartenders and the bar aren’t making the money they once did.”

Palmer’s own website aptly described the place as “a church for down and outers and those who romanticize them, a rare place where high and low rub elbows — bums and poets, thieves and slumming celebrities.”

It has been the hangout for many, from college students to old men. The late pioneering Minneapolis folk-bluesman Spider John Koerner had a reserved seat at the bar when he wasn’t bartending. Jon Hamm of “Mad Men” fame stopped by when he was in town for a pro hockey game in 2021. Bonnie Raitt frequented Palmer’s when she was recording her 1971 debut album in the Twin Cities.

Palmer’s was featured in the films “Old Explorers” (1990), starring James Whitmore and Jose Ferrer and directed by Minneapolis’ own Bill Pohlad, and “Factotum” (2005), based on the Charles Bukowski novel.

In 2014, Esquire named Palmer’s one of the “best bars in America,” commenting “there are dives and dives in this world. There’s the type Guy Fieri calls out, old joints that might not feel like they need to get their hair done before seeing company but are nonetheless fundamentally clean and comfortable and unchallenging. Then there’s Palmer’s."

It has a long history and a sense of survival. As its website points out, Palmer’s has endured Prohibition, bootlegging, police raids (in the 1930s there was a brothel upstairs), two World Wars, the smoking ban, the advent of AA and Starbucks as well as various urban renewal projects.

Opened as Carl’s Bar in 1906, it was renamed Palmer’s in 1950 by Henry Palmer. Adam Folta ran the place from 1959 to 1975 before his son, Roger Folta, took over with Flo Johnstone for the next 20 years.

Lisa Hammer and her husband, Keith Berg, owned the bar from 2001 until musician Tony Zaccardi purchased it in 2018 along with current owners Pat and Sarah Dwyer, who also own another beloved neighborhood bar, Grumpy’s in northeast Minneapolis. (Zaccardi is no longer an owner.)

In recent years, the music side of the bar was handled by another well-known musician, punky singer/guitarist Christy Costello, who was singing the blues Tuesday night about the closure announcement.

“It’s been an honor to have curated the entertainment and events here since February of 2021,” Costello said in a Facebook post. “I’m deeply saddened that it wasn’t enough, but dang did we ever have some great times and memorable events.”

Palmer’s still has a full schedule of live music nightly, including this Saturday’s third annual Summer Slam of tribute bands to Mötley Crüe, Heart, the Strokes and R.E.M. One of its longest-running events, Palmfest, returns July 25-27 with acts performing all day out on the bar’s sprawling patio.

Said Palmer’s Facebook post: “Please join us in saying goodbye to a West Bank institution, raise a glass to all the good times and great people, and make it a last summer to remember here at Palmer’s Bar.”

The cheeky painted sign on the patio will soon take on a new meaning: “Sorry, we’re open.”

Chris Riemenschneider of the Minnesota Star Tribune contributed to this story.