Herb, the Hole’s owner, had moved from Kansas to South Carolina in the ’90s, after selling his software company at the height of the dotcom boom. When he opened his bar, he had wanted to give it the ambience of his two favorite Kansas haunts, Bill and Beth’s Tavern in Shawnee, and Jane’s Corner Tavern in Merriam. He bought the Cosmic Baseball pinball game and the juke box, with its eclectic and frozen-in-time collection of tunes by Buck Owens, Conway Twitty, Merle Haggard, Al Green, War, and Janis Joplin, at auction when Jane’s went out of business. From Bill and Beth’s he got Bill’s secret instructions for the pork tenderloin sandwich. He even decided to locate near a Christian Science Reading Room, just like Jane’s. The only thing missing was a nearby vintage movie house and railroad tracks. And Fecal Matters’ “Apocalypso” on the juke. The house bourbon was Old Quaker, the house scotch Kilt Kastle, and he had an entire cooler dedicated to Mickey’s Big Mouths. Every Friday he had a Rusty Nails special. Business hadn’t been great, but he wasn’t in it for the money—he just enjoyed spending his time there.
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