There's a story which has been going the rounds for years on which no proof has ever been offered, yet it rings so true that there must be at least some element of truth to it. In the hit show "Guys and Dolls," there was a number which brought down the house every night, called "The Oldest, Established, Permanent, Floating Crap Game in New York." If the story we've heard so often is true, Willmar might well lay claim the title of having the "Longest Running Poker Game on the Great Northern System."
According to most versions, the Willmar Hotel was the site of this never-ending poker game which is supposed to have been started by a couple of professional gamblers around the end of World War II. We'll never know why they picked Willmar (if they ever did), but this was as good a place to set up something like that to be found on the Great Northern's main line.
The game, according to the story, just went on -- day and night -- and never stopped. Players stopped in to sit in on the game, played for a while, then gave up their places to other lambs eager to be led to the slaughter. Local players who fancied themselves as pretty good players apparently dropped out early in the game, but the word had spread -- players dropped off the G.N. Passenger trains, went to the hotel, got into the game and stayed as long as they could physically and financially, then caught the next passenger train going in their direction and went home.
How much money changed hands? Impossible to even guess. The game was apparently well run because there were no complaints. Players are supposed to have come from Seattle to Chicago and all points in between.
The Willmar Hotel, while not one of the very earliest hotels in town, opened its doors early on on the town's "Hotel Row," now known as Pacific Avenue. While the Great Northern had its own eating place right beside the depot, all the hotels had dining rooms and the rest of the space in the Row was taken up with cafes and bawdy houses. They all sent barkers to meet each passenger train, to shout out the day's menu and other attractions, and to lead customers to the right places.
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The Depression put the kibosh on a lot of travel, many of the Willmar establishments didn't survive, and gradually, Hotel Row changed. Different types of businesses took their places
in the Row, which had now become just plain Pacific Avenue.
The Willmar Hotel was falling apart and the city wanted something to be done, so
they served notice on the owner that his place had to shape up or be torn down. Whenever he received one of these, he'd hire someone to go out to the open space behind the hotel and start digging a hole. That satisfied the city fathers for a time, and the hole would be filled in. Another notice, another hole. Finally, he gave up the ghost, and the place was sold. The new owners fixed it up, but it never became as popular as it once was and, eventually, it was torn down.
Now only the story of the "Longest Running Poker Game on the Great Northern System" is left to remind us of what once was.
