SCHEER: The old Gazette rite of passage -- visiting the Portage House

Mark Scheer, Niagara Gazette, Niagara Falls, N.Y.
·3 min read
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May 2—On one of the first days I worked as a reporter at the Niagara Gazette, way back in the fall of 1999, I went through a rite of passage for new reporters that involved a late-night stop for drinks at various establishment across the city.

It was the late Mike Hudson, former Gazette city hall reporter and one of the co-founders of the Niagara Falls Reporter, who hung around the longest that night as I got my first real taste of what it was like to enjoy the local nightlife as a Gazette staff member.

From what I can remember, we had a pretty good time.

We started where such things often started — with drinks at Mickey Rimmen's bar, the Arterial Lounge, which was located across the alley next to the old Gazette building on Niagara Street.

We made a few other stops along the way before ending up at the Portage House, the gentlemen's club owned by Larry DeLong.

We outlasted the closing time at every bar in the city that night before Mike and I made our way back to the Gazette after 2 a.m. so we could grab ourselves a couple of copies of that day's edition hot off the press, which was still inside the old Niagara Street building at that time.

I still remember Mike gleefully handed me the copy that featured what would be the first of many Niagara Gazette stories to come with the Mark Scheer byline on it.

It was fun and a real thrill.

It was the sort of experience I signed on for when I decided I'd rather not have a real job and preferred to run around with characters like Hudson and interact with people like DeLong while having the privilege to write newspaper stories for real money at an honest-to-goodness newspaper.

I mention my experience at the Portage House because, as I wrote about this past weekend, DeLong, the bar's former owner, has written and published a book: "It's Not Easy Being Me: Bar Hopping Through Life."

Larry was kind enough to send me a copy and, well, it's a real page turner.

The stuff about owning the Portage House is interesting on its own.

But Larry's story is about more than owning a gentlemen's club in the Falls.

It's about the kid who shined shoes and worked as a pin setter at a bowling alley as he learned how to make a buck while roaming around the streets of his East Side neighborhood.

It's about how he felt being drafted into the Vietnam War at age 21 and the hell he endured while fighting overseas and dealing with the parasites that ultimately sidelined him from action and nearly killed him in the process.

It's the miraculous story of how Larry started writing his life story only after being told by doctors 12 years ago he had a potentially deadly form of throat cancer that would likely kill him.

The good news: Larry survived and lived to tell about it, in writing no less.

Now age 80 and with his cancer in remission, Larry is still bar hopping only he does so in Myrtle Beach, South Carolina these days.

I enjoyed interviewing him and could talk to him for hours about his early years in the Falls and all the "crazy stuff" that went on at the Portage House.

Larry DeLong has lived a colorful life for sure.

People who know the Falls are sure to enjoy reading about it.

If you are interested, copies of DeLong's book, "It's Not Easy Being Me: Bar Hopping Through Life," are available through Amazon.