What’s up with the horse on top of this gay bar, Boise? And Clint Eastwood claim to fame?

Michael Deeds
·4 min read

Driving through Garden City, one might pause to wonder: Why is there a giant palomino rearing on top of a gay bar on Chinden Boulevard?

Isn’t there some story about a Clint Eastwood movie once being filmed at that place?

To solve these mysteries, one must embark upon a journey through Boise history.

Saddle up, Idaho. Let’s ride.

Oddly Idaho explores curious quirks and nostalgic moments in the Gem State.
Oddly Idaho explores curious quirks and nostalgic moments in the Gem State.

Ranch Club past

Although it’s now called the Somewhere Bar, longtime Boiseans remember it as the Ranch Club.

The landmark building at 3544 W. Chinden Blvd. has a nightclub history that stretches back more than seven decades.

The building was moved to Garden City in pieces from New Plymouth in 1949. When it opened in 1950, gambling was legal in Idaho, and the sound of slot machines filled the air.

And, yes, it’s true. A brief scene in Clint Eastwood’s 1980 movie “Bronco Billy” was shot out front. That’s when it was still owned by its longtime operators, the Arana family.

“My dad had to put up a sign for the filming that said, ‘Merle Haggard appearing nightly,’ ” Trina Arana-Barrett told the Idaho Statesman in 2002. “He got calls for a month afterward. Everybody wanted to know where Merle Haggard was.”

Specifically, the marquee in the movie read: “Now appearing Merle Haggard & the Strangers.”

After the Aranas sold the Ranch Club in 2002, it cycled through owners — mostly as a divey restaurant and lounge. Bucking modern trends, it even held out as one of the Boise area’s last cigarette-friendly bars. Ownership opposed attempts to pass a Garden City ordinance banning smoking as recently as 2014.

Garden City has changed a lot over the years. And the former Ranch Club became the Somewhere Bar in 2021. But the horse has remained.
Garden City has changed a lot over the years. And the former Ranch Club became the Somewhere Bar in 2021. But the horse has remained.

At least occasionally, those were strange times. In 2014, KBOI-TV Channel 2 did a story when the Ranch Club’s marquee outside treated passers-by to the message, “MONDAY NIGHT COME GET ****** UP.” Except the asterisks were the actual f-word, with a single letter replaced by a question mark.

The Ranch Club cleaned up its act during another transfer of ownership, when it was remodeled and reopened as a non-smoking country bar in 2017. It closed about a year and a half later, changed owners again, reopened — and shuttered for good in 2020.

Meanwhile, the Ranch Club horse statue watched over Chinden Boulevard.

Finally, the building was revived in 2021 with a new name and concept. The Somewhere Bar describes itself as “Boise’s only gay-owned LGBTQIA+ community bar.”

It’s definitely the city’s only gay-owned bar with a palomino on top.

Horse history

Imagine a Boise cage match featuring the Ranch Club stallion, Rudy the Rooster (from Jim’s Coffee Shop, now at Capri Restaurant) and Betty the Washerwoman (atop the Maytag building, now at Cucina di Paolo restaurant).

I’m putting my money on hard-working Betty. Her biceps must be serious.

Still, the horse is a classic. It has caught the eyes of passing motorists for more than 70 years. Arana-Barrett’s family owned the Ranch Club for 52 of those years.

A horse statue adorns the top of the bar Somewhere, formerly the Ranch Club, at 3544 W. Chinden Blvd. in Garden City.
A horse statue adorns the top of the bar Somewhere, formerly the Ranch Club, at 3544 W. Chinden Blvd. in Garden City.

“It was a good ol’ place,” she recalled when I spoke to her in 2017. Trina told me that the horse did not come from a bar in Ontario, Oregon, as some have claimed. Or from a Las Vegas casino. The palomino was made for the Ranch Club, and “was never on any other business.”

That said? I had to remind her that the horse was not the original. There’s black-and-white photographic proof of a different rearing stallion atop the Ranch Club. It had a cowboy on it waving an illuminated lasso.

“Oh, yes, yes, yes! I forgot about that one,” Trina exclaimed. “And that’s funny! Because that horse was on our matches down there forever — the horse with the lasso.”

At least one Facebooker remembered that first horse, commenting: “I think the rider blew off in a storm about ‘63, ‘64. They left the saddle on for a couple of years, but people kept trying to climb the roof and pose, so the saddle had to go, too. The lariat was a huge neon circle that looked like it was spinning.”

That all sounds plausible, right?

Trina was able to verify another gem of information. The current palomino suffered through a penoplasty operation after a criminal chopped off his, um, goodies. “Yes, his ‘private parts’ were removed in the late ‘90s!” she confirmed.

In retrospect, that crime took serious cojones.

“We all laughed about it,” Trina remembered.

Within days, the Ranch Club’s sign company replaced the horse’s missing manhood, she said.

The horse above Somewhere Bar in Garden City, which for decades was the Ranch Club, is not the first. There’s black-and-white photographic proof of a different rearing stallion atop the Ranch Club that had a cowboy on it waving an illuminated lasso.
The horse above Somewhere Bar in Garden City, which for decades was the Ranch Club, is not the first. There’s black-and-white photographic proof of a different rearing stallion atop the Ranch Club that had a cowboy on it waving an illuminated lasso.

Bucking the past

Nowadays, the Ranch Club horse — er, Somewhere horse — is galloping into the future.

It isn’t accurate to categorize the Somewhere Bar as a “Brokeback Mountain” version of the Ranch Club. Country bands no longer perform inside. Instead, the Somewhere stage sometimes features drag shows.

Outside, the building has traded its longtime log-cabin look for a slightly more 21st century vibe.

What would Bronco Billy think of all this?

Perhaps he’d tip his hat.

Attempts to reach Somewhere’s owner for comment by phone were unsuccessful.