Former Portage House owner still bar hopping through life

May 1—A life-threatening throat cancer diagnosis turned Larry DeLong into something he never thought he'd be: a published author who keeps a daily writing schedule.

In between bouts of chemotherapy and instances where he felt so sick he could hardly move, the founder and owner of the Portage House bar and adult entertainment nightclub in the City of Niagara Falls sat at his kitchen table and started pounding out pages.

Faced with the very real possibility of death when he started writing, DeLong felt certain his story would end with his thoughts on preparing to die.

Instead, it turned out to be just the latest adventure in a life full of them.

"It became difficult to even chew water because the radiation everyday was right in my throat," DeLong said. "I thought, 'OK, I'm on my way out eventually' so I started writing a journal. I crawled to the kitchen table every night to write down some of my achievements over the years."

A few pages a night turned into chapters and, eventually, a book titled: "It's Not Easy Being Me: Bar Hopping Through Life." Delong published the book on Amazon in December.

"Basically, the journal was supposed to be for my family, my loved ones, my kids and grandkids and stuff like that. I thought, 'I'm checking out,' so I wanted them to know why I did certain things over the years so maybe they would be able to get to know me a little better," DeLong explained.

The book chronicles the ups and downs of the often-colorful 80 years of DeLong's life, which has included plenty of late night bar hopping, a challenging tour as a soldier in the Vietnam War and a difficult battle with Stage 4 throat and tongue cancer that nearly killed him.

Through it all, DeLong said he tried to keep busy and keep working, two traits he started to develop before he entered his teenage years.

Born in Pennsylvania, DeLong's family moved to the Falls when he was 6 years old. He grew up on 11th Street in the city's East Side neighborhood and started earning his own money working as a shoe-shine boy at age 9.

When he was 13, he got a job setting pins at DeFazio's Bowling Alley, which gave him his first taste of working late nights at places where older people drank and socialized. He held several part-time jobs as a teenager, including sweeping, mopping and cleaning at a pair of bars owned by the family of two friends.

"I was still going to school, but I was still in the bars," he said, adding, "I was always in the bars."

After graduating from Niagara Falls High School in 1961, Delong went to work at DuPont. A plant-wide strike caused him to take a job tending bar at the M & M Lounge on Niagara Avenue.

"I always found myself going back to bars because that's what I know and that's what I loved," he said. "I loved the camaraderie, the people. Every day was different. You saw different people and (heard) different stories."

The first real tough test of his life came on Nov. 25, 1964, three days before Thanksgiving. It was the day he got drafted into military service during the Vietnam War. He was 21 years old and facing an uncertain future.

"Being young at that time and being patriotic, I said, 'OK I'll go and serve my country,'" he said. "At that time, we weren't aware of Vietnam not until a little bit later."

The experience changed him forever.

"When they sent me over to Vietnam, I knew I wasn't going over on a vacation or to sit behind a desk or anything like that," he said. "I was being sent over there to fight.

"The old saying war is hell is absolutely true, not only the war part but just the conditions," he added.

DeLong spent his first six months in Vietnam in combat and the remainder of his tour of duty in various hospitals battling stomach and flesh-eating parasites.

In 1966, he finally overcame his health issues and returned to the United States.

When he got back to the Falls, he returned to DuPont before deciding it was time to be his own boss.

Delong started working as a salesman and enjoyed success selling home study courses for LaSalle Extension University and later insurance for the Independent Order of Foresters, a fraternal benefit society headquartered in Ontario.

By the early 1970s, he had enough money to do something he always wanted to do — own his own business.

He bought and renovated an old Eagles Club building on Portage Road.

In 1974, he opened the doors at the Portage House bar and restaurant for the first time.

There were no topless female dancers then. They came much later in the 1990s following a dispute with city officials who rejected DeLong's plan to build a golf dome near the bar.

While the city's zoning rules didn't allow golf domes to be built in the neighborhood, DeLong discovered the city codes did not preclude him from running a gentlemen's club.

"I figured since it was in the right area to have topless dancers, I went in that direction. That was the cause of it because they turned my dome down," he said.

While it had the sort of reputation that often comes with a strip club, Delong said the Portage House was much more to the bar's many regulars.

He took pride in knowing he ran the only bar in the city with two regulation horseshoe pits, a basketball court, two volleyball courts, an outdoor event stage, an outdoor bar and a play area where customers could let their kids play on slides and swings.

"There was nothing like that around," he said.

DeLong also offered the only limousine service in Niagara Falls for many years.

Between 1974 and the closure of the Portage House in 2005, DeLong came up with what he describes as a lot of "crazy stuff" to help keep the business going.

For years, he kept a live python in a back room. What started out as a 3-foot oddity grew over years of feedings into a 13-and-a-half foot, 138-pound beast by the time DeLong finally decided to get rid of it.

As a promotion one year, he organized a funeral procession to say goodbye to "Mr. Summer." Customers tossed old rock n' roll T-shirts, sneakers and whatever else they wanted buried into a casket that served as a symbol of the end of another summer season.

"We had to map out the route that we were doing and we brought the casket back to the Portage House and buried it in the backyard. We had the wake at the Portage House," DeLong said.

Of course, some of DeLong's "crazy" ideas worked out better than others.

One of his worst: filling the bar with sand one winter.

He said he hoped it would give customers a sense that they could still enjoy the beach-like qualities of summer while it was cold and snowing outside.

Instead, DeLong said, the promotion kicked up so much dust that he had to continuously dust and water down the bar.

"At the beach, it looks OK but closed in, when you step and make a movement, the sand dust gets all over the place. It just travels," he said.

And then there was the cleanup.

"I couldn't wait until the winter was over," he said. "It was a job getting it out of there. It was in every crack and crevice you could think of. I was just glad to see it go."

DeLong hated to see the Portage House go, too.

However, by the mid-2000s, he was receiving offers to sell — several of which he rejected. The most interest came from Niagara Falls Redevelopment, a company that would eventually acquire 140 acres of land in a development territory bounded by Portage Road, Niagara Street and John B. Daly and Rainbow boulevards.

In 2005, while in the middle of a divorce, DeLong decided to sell his property to NFR for $200,000.

It was a bittersweet decision.

"There was a lot of bars in the city at that time so you had to be very competitive, but I totally enjoyed it because I enjoy people. That was always the best part, just enjoying people," he said.

DeLong moved to Myrtle Beach, South Carolina where he planned to enjoy the retired life. He spent several months just relaxing and enjoying the sea breeze and beach living. He said he swapped driving limousines for tooling around on mopeds.

"After about six months, I got kind of bored and I figured this ain't the life for me. I wanted to keep busy," he said.

DeLong picked up a job working security which he did for about six years before receiving the startling diagnosis that a lingering hoarseness in his throat was actually a potentially deadly form of cancer.

"My team of doctors said it was the biggest tumor they'd ever observed in an individual in my throat," DeLong said.

That was 12 years ago.

While the treatment was rough, DeLong's happy to report that it worked. His cancer has now been in remission for 11 years, a situation his doctors are at a loss to explain.

He's amazed and pleased to still have the black-colored hair of a younger man.

"It never fell out and it never turned gray," he said. "I even asked my doctor, 'is all this damn treatment working?'"

These days, DeLong spends the bulk of his time taking care of his cat and Nancy Stone, his girlfriend of 12 years who suffered a stroke and requires regular help with normal daily tasks like eating, showering and getting dressed.

When he's not busy being a caregiver, DeLong continues to be a daily practitioner of three things: exercising, drinking beer and writing.

He has a daily, full body workout routine and regularly makes the rounds at a dozen or so bars in his neighborhood. He stays away from hard liquor and sticks almost exclusively to beer.

"I still do my bar hopping every day," he said.

As for the writing, it's a process he enjoys. He's working on two more books — one on his experiences during the Vietnam War titled "No Purple Heart for PTSD: My Vietnam War Experiences," and another on the rigors of caring for a disabled loved one called "It's Not Easy Being a Caregiver for Someone You Care For."

"It's like a type of relief," DeLong said of writing. "People keep constantly asking me, 'Larry, I don't know how you do it.' I say, 'I don't know. I just do it.' I get asked that all the time."

DeLong also still makes his way back to Niagara Falls at least once a year, usually in August when he visits family members and friends. He often stays at Casale's Tavern on Buffalo Avenue, which is owned by his long-time friend, Joe Casale.

Where does author Larry DeLong go from here?

He's not set any on specific plan.

With all that's happened to him over the years, he's just happy to still be able to enjoy the ride.

"It all depends on my health, but I'm healthy as a horse. I get around like a 40 year old," he said.

"I've done so much in my life and I still have more to go," he added.

Copies of DeLong's first book, "It's Not Easy Being Me: Bar Hopping Through Life," are available on Amazon at www.amazon.com/Its-Not-Easy-Being-Me/dp/B0BQY8NFH8.

Delong can be reached by mail at: P.O. Box 1779, Myrtle Beach, South Carolina, 29578.