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UNTER’
H
S
INN
This rural coastal restaurant and
tavern runs a special tradition
By MATT LOVE
I
I sat drinking a beer at the lon-
gest bar I’ve seen on the Oregon
or Washington coasts and listened
to a Hunter’s Inn regular talking
to another regular with exquisite
detail and superb narrative skill
about his losing battle with a wily
rat he was trying to exterminate.
He’d killed other rodents with the
usual poison, but this certain rat
refrained from digesting it and
another, more lethal one.
“He wouldn’t touch it. He
knew,” said the man, with obvious
respect for his adversary. I don’t
think he wanted to kill it anymore.
I thought it was about the best
story I’d heard in a long, long time,
and it happened inside Naselle’s
Hunter’s Inn on a weekday after-
noon.
There was a lot more to Hunt-
er’s Inn than the great rat tale, the
soothing rustic ambiance or the
fact that during the hunting and
fi shing seasons, the establishment’s
fi ve or six rooms are routinely
booked. The house whiskey is Ca-
nadian Hunter with a new logo of
two huskies. It instantly reminded
me of my dearly departed husky,
so I had to chase the beer with a
tribute shot. The whiskey wasn’t
all that good, (maybe try it on the
rat?), but my husky deserved it
after almost 17 years of compan-
ionship.
Hunter’s Inn also features a
server named Nicole, who is an ex-
cellent storyteller in her own right.
I noticed a piece of paper taped
up behind the bar with a headline
that read, “The Wall!!!” and asked
Nicole about it. She informed me
The Wall contained a list of names
of regulars who participate in a
Pay it Forward-kind of game. It
works like this: when a customer
buys another customer a drink
who doesn’t want to drink it that
moment, the recipient’s name goes
on The Wall and they can claim the
freebie later.
That got me thinking. Could I
buy a drink for Elvis Presley and
have his name written on The Wall
and thus create a tiny private exis-
tential mystery in Naselle? I asked
Nicole and she went to confer with
the owner. No, the person had to be
real and alive. Sorry Emily Dickin-
son, you would have been next.
Nicole seemed positively giddy
to tell me about The Wall, but then
she said, “That’s nothing. You’ve
got to hear about The Jar.” Then
she walked away to serve a patron.
The Jar? Nicole returned and
directed my attention to a jar
behind the bar loaded with one
dollar bills and another one with
numbered ticket stubs. The jar had
a four-character number written on
the label.
Nicole told me the game
worked liked this: Any customer
could write their name on a ticket
and have that ticket deposited into
the jar. The customer kept the other
half of the stub. Every day, a Hunt-
er’s Inn bartender added a dollar
to the money jar and then drew
PHOTO BY DANNY MILLER
Hunter’s Inn in Naselle, Washington, has a restaurant, bar and small motel.
PHOTO BY DANNY MILLER
PHOTO BY DANNY MILLER
Hunter’s Inn features a long bar.
a ticket from the other jar. The
ticket’s winning number was listed
on the label and never announced.
If a customer happened to visit the
bar that day, and noticed he had
the winning number, and had his
ticket with him, then he won the
kitty. If the customer wasn’t there,
or didn’t see that he’d won (which
happened recently), his name went
back into the jar.
Hunter’s Inn in Naselle, Washington, runs a low-
key daily raffl e in The Jar.
This game had been going for
30 years; the tickets with names on
them have never been replaced. In
all my years of coastal tavern life, I
had never heard of such a tradition.
Naturally, I got a ticket and now
I’m in The Jar for life. I know I’m
going to win, too.
“We really should go through
and get the dead people out,” said
Nicole.
No! Leave the dead alone. They
rest immortal inside The Jar in a
way an epitaph on a headstone
can’t possibly match.
Matt Love is the author/editor of 14
books, including “A Nice Piece of
Astoria” and “The Great Birthright.”
His books are available at coastal
bookstores or his website,
nestuccaspitpress.com