Ulrich's, Buffalo’s oldest bar enjoys new prosperity at Ellicott and Virginia
Ulrich’s Tavern thrives with growth of medical corridor
By Jay Rey
BUFFALO NEWS 01/29/08
If you’re down on Buffalo, and convinced there’s no hope for the city, pull up a stool at Ulrich’s Tavern, where owner Jim Daley will be pouring the drinks. Daley is encouraged, not just for his bar — the oldest in the city — but for this slice of Buffalo that surrounds the tavern on the corner of Ellicott and Virginia streets.
Up the block, Roswell Park Cancer Institute has rebuilt and grown. Next door, Hauptman-Woodward Medical Research Institute opened. Across the street, the University at Buffalo moved into its new biomedical building.
Now, Gov. Eliot L. Spitzer is backing UB’s plans to expand here, along the Buffalo Niagara Medical Campus, while the state just awarded $4.5 million to renovate the old Trico building for start-up companies in the biotechnology industry — all in hopes this accumulation of innovation can stimulate the region’s economy.
“You can do all the Bass Pros you want, but this biomedicine is legitimate,” said Daley from behind the bar one recent afternoon. “You can feel it.” As this small corner of Buffalo makes a comeback, so, too, is Daley’s plucky little bar, which has survived everything from Prohibition to “urban renewal,” from the loss of its blue-collar base to the emergence of a new breed of barflies. In a way, Buffalo’s story is Ulrich’s story.
Daley’s parents, Jim and Erika, bought the bar in 1954. But it dates back to 1868, when it was a grocery store and saloon in a fast-growing German neighborhood home to Buffalo’s brewing industry.
The tavern changed owners several times before 1906, when a young beer-wagon driver named Michael Ulrich would take over for the next four decades. It was a favorite for politicians in the city’s German community. In fact, during Prohibition, the bar was made into a deli and restaurant, while the upstairs hotel became a private speakeasy for the pols.
By the time the Daleys took over, the bar was booming. The regulars from the neighborhood stopped by. Three shifts of workers poured in from Trico, the windshield wiper factory next door. It was a popular watering hole for reporters, office workers and pressmen at the Buffalo Courier-Express.
“My parents would open at 10 a.m. and close at 3 a.m.,” said Daley, who has been working behind the bar since he was 18. “And that didn’t mean they’d always close — they’d just turn out the lights.”
When urban renewal hit, the old neighborhood was leveled, and in the 1970s, the city took the building from the Daleys through eminent domain. The Daleys still ran the bar, paying the city rent, while the family fought City Hall in court for years, eventually winning their case in 1982. By this time, the Courier would fold, Trico slowly died, patrons moved to the suburbs, and the drinking culture had changed.
Once, Ulrich’s was one of 30 establishments in a four-block area. By the 1990s, it was the last one, and barely getting by. The family often thought about closing. “We said that a lot,” said Daley, 49. “But you’re so entrenched, and, at a certain point, what else are you going to do? You’re not going to get anything for it.”
Daley made some adjustments when he took over for his parents in 2000.
He pitched the business as the oldest continuous tavern in the city and played on its roots, serving up home-cooked German food with the atmosphere of an Irish pub.
But things really began to change a few years ago, when Hauptman-Woodward opened its new research center next door. Young researchers dropped by for a drink after work. Lab technicians stopped in for the knockwurst platter at lunch. Scientists came for Beakers ’n’ Beers, a monthly happy hour.
“We went from a mostly blue-collar bar,” Daley said, “to a white-collar bar.” Today, there are about 8,500 people working throughout the medical corridor. That means the future is bright again. “Last year was very good,” Daley said. “It’s the best year I had. We’re adding new people and not losing people.”
And while the clientele has changed, Ulrich’s hasn’t.
Step through the door of the long, narrow tavern, and there’s still the same cherry and stained-glass back bar Ulrich installed, while the restaurant’s tables and chairs are vintage 1920s. Daley is behind the bar, as the lunch crowd dwindles. “Jim, thank you,” says one customer, as he walks out the door. “Great lunch.” “Thanks, come again,” Daley says.
Daley often thinks of his father, “Hoops,” who died in 2002. “If he could see the bar now, it would validate his work,” Daley said. “I think he’d be happy about it.” A waitress walks up to give Daley a drink order. “Jim,” she says, “Absolut martini with olives.” A martini? What would Hoops say? Daley grins. “I don’t think he would have made martinis,” Daley says. “Back then, it was shots and beer.”
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