With a photo from 1915 showing Anchorage as a tent city, and The Panhandle among the tents, it is definitely in the running to beAnchorage's oldest bar.

A photo from 1916 shows The Panhandle on 4th Avenue in what appears to be a frame building. It was on the north side of 4th Ave. It moved to its current location on the south side in the early 1940s and was in a log building. It was rebuilt after a fire in 1949, pretty much as it is today except the east half was Annie's Cafe until 1990 when the wall was removed and the bar widened. It is currently located at 312 W. 4th Ave.

"Notorious Bars of Alaska" claims that during prohibition there was a tunnel connecting the bar with another bar, The Union Club, four doors down at 338 W. 4th., currently occupied by The Avenue. Tony and Jerry don't believe this, but there are several patches in the basement that could have been a tunnel entrance. These could have been used by earlier bars occupying these locations as both the Union Club and The Panhandle arrived on the scene about 1941, well after prohibition.

There is also a street entrance to the basement, which housed the Silver Slipper. This was also an entrance to an illegal bar during prohibition. The Silver Slipper came into existence about 1950 to 1958 and was for invited customers only, who did not want to rub elbows with the rougher crowd upstairs. The emblem of the Silver Slipper can still be seen on the floor.

Jerry Buffington, who is 73 years old, told me the story of when he was a patron at the Reef Bar at 326 W. 4th Ave. in 1971 and got into a "fight with the Reef's bartender." It was closing and the bartender was angry at someone's cheapness, so he threw a handful of drink tokens at them on the sidewalk. They would throw them back and the fight continued. Jerry still chuckles as he related how the street people were coming in for days and drinking with the tokens.

The token that started this research is shown on the front page. It is a recent discovery, and the only one known. It is made of cardboard, 38mm and printed black on tan (because of age, this may not be the original color of the token). Cardboard is a very fragile material (as compared to metal), and survivorship of this type of token is low.