LITTLE ORLEANS – A priest walking into a bar is no joke at Bill’s Place, a remote, log-cabin hangout right in the heart of Western Maryland’s 49,000-acre Green Ridge State Forest.
During a recent visit to the quirky dive bar in eastern Allegany County, Father John “Jack” Lombardi greeted patrons as he shook hands and moved easily from person to person.
When the pastor of St. Peter in Hancock and St. Patrick in Little Orleans discovered that Jack Schoenadel, the eatery’s owner and a St. Patrick parishioner, had just celebrated his 69th birthday, he prayed with him on the spot – raising hands in a blessing as others downed beers.
In August, when motorcyclists from near and far will converge on Little Orleans for an annual rally, Father Lombardi plans to offer a blessing of the fleet outside a bar that features not one, but two well-worn outdoor statues of the Blessed Virgin Mary and a statue of St. Francis of Assisi.
“The bikers can get kind of rowdy,” admitted John Walker, a parishioner of St. Patrick and a regular at Bill’s Place. “(The priest) shows up and passes out rosaries and religious literature, and he has a calming effect on the crowd.”
The blending of the secular and the sacred seems natural at an establishment with deep roots in Western Maryland.
In the late 1960s, Bill Schoenadel, Jack Schoenadel’s father, purchased an old country store that had operated for many generations in Little Orleans. Bill Schoenadel added a restaurant to the store in 1972 and eventually renamed it Bill’s Place. Jack Schoenadel took over after his father’s 2013 death.
In addition to a bar and restaurant, Bill’s Place is a general store, a bait shop and all-around community hub. The original building was destroyed in a 2000 fire, with the new one built a year later.
“We’re the only place in town,” Schoenadel said with a laugh. “If you want to meet someone, you say, ‘Go to Bill’s Place.’ ”
Schoenadel, whose wife of 32 years, Ann, helps with the cooking, said the eatery serves chicken, fish, shrimp, hamburgers, pork chops and other typical bar fare. “Our big thing is probably the fried baloney sandwich,” he said.
Most patrons are locals, but Schoenadel said the establishment also attracts loyal customers who travel two hours on the weekend from Curtis Bay, Essex and Dundalk. It also welcomes anglers, hunters, campers, hikers and bicyclists who travel the C&O Canal Trail.
Schoenadel said there are sometimes people experiencing homelessness traveling the trail who come to Bill’s Place looking for food. He gives it to them freely, without a fuss.
“We feed them and send them on their way,” he said. “We make sure they have shoes on their feet. You do for people what you can do.”
Walker said he was once one of the homeless people helped by Bill Schoenadel. After retiring from the U.S. Navy, Walker went through a difficult divorce and spent his days hiking the Canal Trail and living on a camping ground. Bill Schoenadel helped him find a job and get housing.
“He was a really super guy,” Walker recalled. “You know, people out here in Western Maryland are very seriously independent. We’re American and we’re God-fearing. And that was his way.”
Walker recalled that Bill Schoenadel, a printer for The Cumberland Times-News, also arranged for a large crucifix to be relocated from Cumberland to the sanctuary of St. Patrick after its original home closed.
The elder Schoenadel still seems to be ever present at Bill’s Place, with a sign bearing his likeness hanging over the bar. It is inscribed with the date of his death. “Gone fishing,” it says, “Bill. Jan. 5, 2013.”
Other adornments include stuffed deer and turkeys. Overhead, more than $10,000 in bills signed by customers are attached to panels screwed to the ceiling. The tradition started many years ago, Jack Schoenadel said, when a customer wanted to show he had good credit.
“It just caught on,” Schoenadel remembered. “We quit doing it about three years ago. We were running out of room.”
These days, a for-sale sign hangs in a front window. Schoenadel said it has been difficult in recent years to find workers to help him run the place.
“I don’t want to turn it over to just anybody,” he said. “I want the right person to have it so we can run as we have for the last 55 years and not change anything, you know?”
Email George Matysek at gmatysek@CatholicReview.org
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