Photo courtesy of Tommy Szocinski Bartender Mindy Caswell works behind the bar at a bustling Rapid River Pub this past Friday night.

RAPID RIVER — The current owner — newest in a long series over about 130 years — of the Rapid River Pub has the goal of streamlining operations without losing the nostalgia and charm of the small town. Thomas Szocinski purchased the local hotspot in June of 2023 and is expanding its reach; soon, customers will be able to enjoy a huge outdoor area and have food delivered to their homes.

When Rapid River was a booming logging town, Delta Cafe, built in the 1890s, was a restaurant downstairs and hotel above. Their rooms were frequented by loggers and hunters.

An early owner of the Delta Cafe (now Rapid River Pub) was Albert Caswell. In the ’20s, he also sold puppies of various breeds and sometimes canaries from the establishment.

Under the ownership of Albert Caswell, installation of a suction fan and canopy by John Mollengree of Gladstone made it “an up-to-date cafe” in 1927.

Two years later, a Hollywood celebrity paused his paws outside the place.

“Leo, the Metro-Goldwin-Mayer lion, with his attendants, gave the town a once-over Tuesday afternoon. The caravan stopped in from of the Delta cafe, where scored of people gathered to do homage to the magnificent specimen of the king of beasts,” printed the Daily Press in on August 1, 1929.

In the spring of 1945, Caswell sold his property to William Smith of Fayette, who had been in the mercantile business for 10 years. The sale included the Delta Cafe and the building that had housed the Richard Caswell general store, which relocated.

Next door to the cafe used to be a restaurant, then a bait and tackle shop, then a restaurant again. On the other side of that was Harry Buchman’s general store, which is now just grassy open space.

In May of 1945, Smith was advertising the “modern bedrooms” of the Delta Cafe as available “either by night or week.” It was Smith who changed the name of the ground floor establishment to Bill’s Bar.

In 1947, Smith sold the business to Leon and Florence Lord, who retained the name Bill’s Bar.

A few years later, the Jacob Hewitt family bought the establishment, which became the Rapid River Hotel and Bar in the early ’50s.

By 1960, it was Bill’s Bar again. It was purchased and operated under the same name by Frank and Darlene Shope in 1971.

Current owner Thomas Szocinski says it was called Rascals for a time before being changed back to Bill’s Bar.

The owners who really put in a lot of work to transforming the bar-restaurant into its current physical state were Greg Sayers and Mike Hebert, Szocinski said. The Heberts (Mike and Roxann) had owned the Rapid River Pub for 13 years immediately before Szocinski bought it in 2023, and Sayers was the propietor before them.

“Greg Sayers put a lot of construction into this building to kind of get it to where it is,” Szocinski said. “Mike continued that as well. So now we really have morphed both of those buildings.”

What had been a separate entity to the south is now joined as part of the Rapid River Pub as almost a behind-the-scenes kitchen extension — behind the walls of the bar area are a prep area, refrigerators and freezers, a dishwashing station and some stock.

One upgrade that Mike had done was to reface the bar, which was installed in about the ’50s or ’60s. It’s still the same structure but with a new log front.

At points in time, the pub had just been a watering hole. Now, it’s got a solid selection for lunch and dinner, and many people come just for the food.

“Mike’s goal was to bring a more robust menu to Rapid River, and that’s what he was successfully able to do,” Szocinski relayed.

Soon after the unexpected death of their 29-year-old son, Travis, in the spring of 2022, Mike and Roxann listed the Rapid River Pub up for sale.

Enter Szocinski on the scene. He was looking for something to keep him in the place he loved.

Leo “Bummy” Hazen, Szocinski’s grandfather, had found that the U.P. was his true home after visiting a friend he’d made during World War II who was from Gladstone. Bummy bought property on Wilsey Bay on the Stonington Peninsula and built a log cabin there.

Szocinski was born and raised downstate, but visited his grandparents, Bummy and Phyllis Hazen, as often as he could.

“I grew up spending all my free time up here. …I had more friends here in Rapid than I did even at my own high school,” he said.

After graduating in 1996, he moved up to Wilsey Bay. He attended Lake Superior State University, lived on campus but came back to the Rapid and Stonington area on the weekends. While living in Sault Ste. Marie, he worked as a cook at Antlers Restaurant.

After graduating from LSSU with a degree in environmental science, Szocinski worked for a few different companies and lived in a few different places as he built his career.

Three-and-a-half years ago, Szocinski said, he left a big company and took a job with Groundwater Environmental Services (GES) as their vapor intrusion subject matter expert.

“‘Just let me move back to Rapid River… I want you to let me work remotely, and then I’ll fly wherever I need to fly,'” Szocinski said he told GES. He had previously been living in California, but wanted to get back to the U.P.

He decided that buying the pub from the Heberts was a great way to become more closely involved with Rapid River.

Szocinski knew he wanted to change some things — not to turn the Rapid River Pub into something different, but take some steps to enhance the experience. For instance, switching to an electronic POS system and giving the servers tablets instead of hand-written tickets meant that orders could reach the kitchen more quickly, and it made it easy to track which menu items were selling.

Fully expecting that this endeavor would be an investment, not an immediate source of supplemental income, Szocinski also bought a new dishwashing machine after one night of hand-washing Friday night fish fry plates himself.

Still with a full-time job as a scientist, Szocinski knew that he would need to appoint good managers and staff who could keep the business running as a well-oiled machine.

“I immediately found, after the first few weeks of owning the pub, who (were) my rising stars,” he said. General manager Beth now keeps things rolling with the help of an assistant manager and a solid team.

His son was still finishing high school in California at the time, so for the first year, Szocinski was still living out west and flying to Rapid once a month or so. In July of 2024, he found a home on Garth Point and is now a full-time resident — as he’d dreamed for so long.

The owner’s love of the area and his memories on Stonington are reflected on the menu. There’s the “Wilsey Bay Walleye” sandwich, his grandmother’s recipe, on a pretzel bun — just like she used to hand Bummy and little Tom after they’d been out fishing.

There’s also the “Big Bummy,” like the hefty burgers Szocinski’s grandfather used to make.

Otherwise, a lot of things on the menu are as they were when the Heberts ran the place — though Szocinski did add his own award-winning chili recipe.

Pizza has been the number one seller in June, Szocinski said. Number two is the perch basket, the Bay de Noc burger (formerly called just the Bay burger) is third, and the walleye is fourth.

An appetizer that has earned raves is the Wisconsin cheese cubes — unlike most cheese curds, the cubes aren’t breaded; the cheese itself fries to a crispy crust on the outside. Those are served with a homemade jalapeño jelly.

Soon, food from the Rapid River Pub will be available to order for delivery through DoorDash.

Though the pub had 12 employees when Szocinski took over, it now has 26 to better serve its customers. Nine of the staff are full-time, 17 part-time.

Szocinski expects to hire three or four more when the much-anticipated outdoor area opens. The 3,400-square-foot fenced-in space with a 20-by-40-foot pergola over a music stage will seat 76 people, nearly doubling the capacity of the business, which fits 85 indoors.

The Rapid River Pub opens at 11:30 a.m. Monday through Saturday and at noon on Sunday. Like many bars, closing time is dependent on customers, but is often 2 a.m. Thursday through Saturday nights and about 11 p.m. on weekdays.

The outdoor area launches with an opening party and cornhole tournament on July 19.