In 1954, Matt Bristol took over a dark, 24-by-55-foot 3.2 joint he bought from a guy named Nibs Martin. The bar could hold 78 thirsty patrons. A couple month’s after he changed the name of the place to Matt’s, a cook was flipping hamburgers on a two-foot-wide grill at the end of the bar and a customer said he was tired of eating regular burgers. The guy asked to have a couple patties crimped around a chunk of American cheese. The cook obliged and the Jucy Lucy was born. Bristol, a friendly, balding fellow who liked hunting and fishing better than working began selling hamburgers with a misspelled, risque name as fast as he could make them. Over the decades many of our favorite neighborhood tavern’s like Bob’s, The Red Feather and The Pink Elephant have gone under, but the Jucy Lucy kept Matt’s afloat. In 1998 Scott Nelson purchased the bar. He didn’t change a thing. Bristol passed away in 2014, just hours before President Barack Obama ate a Jucy Lucy at the bar he founded.
