Black Jack's Bar

"Sometimes, but seldom, called a tavern."

"Black Jack's Bar was a freight car taken off its wheels and set on gravel at the other end of the bridge crossing the Little Prickly Pear Creek. "

Norman Maclean from A River Runs Through It

Fictional Story of a Model Structure
Building a Model Structure in HO Scale
Fictional Account of Life in the Summer of 1937

Fictional Story of Model Structure
by Paul Wussow

After splitting a log for a bar and gathering a few grocery crates as stools, Black Jack opened the boxcar doors and he was in business. Some of his patrons with ax and saw helped cut windows into the sides of the car. Later, as the bugs were getting healthy, Jack cut a hole for a 36" wooden door into the side of the car facing the road and closed the boxcar doors. This was good for the patrons and also for the bugs, many of which have been seen in drunken flight after a visit to the old boxcar.

As the chill of fall turned the leaves to gold and then brown, the bar flies started to complain about the cold drafts, not from the keg, but from the front door each time it was opened. After a few weeks of these gripes, and lots of 3-7-77 bar whiskey, Jack persuaded the regulars to construct an entryway from parts of an old house that was being ripped down back in the town of Wolf Creek. With saws, hammers and bottles in hand, the current entryway was constructed.

This watering hole has received very little maintenance, although the sporting element of Great Falls does grease the bar regularly. Jack continues to supply their needs with his 3-7-77 from somewhere up Sheep Gulch and each year more fishermen gather to tell their fish stories.

This year (1937) we find Long Bow, Jack, and Old Rawhide at the bar waiting for itinerant fisherman to stop in and buy the drinks. As the summer gets warmer we will see Paul and Norman Maclean fishing the creek while Norman's brother-in-law Neil tells tall tales to impress Old Rawhide, or at least himself.

Model Building in HO Scale

Black Jack's Bar was created by kitbashing a Roundhouse 50' Outside Brace Double Steel Door Boxcar. The car was cut down in length by the size of one door and reassembled. Windows were drilled, cut out, filed square. and fitted with sheet styrene which had been frosted and dusted. The entry area was scratch built with sheet styrene, MDC window casting, paper stock and Campbell corrugate. The model was painted and weathered during and after construction. Detail parts came from many leftovers found in my junk box.

It is interesting that in Maclean's book he refers to "the sign of the Great Northern Railroad, a mountain goat gazing through a white beard on a world painted red." As I was planing this scene, I learned that the Great Northern may not have adopted the goat for their cars until well after 1937. I would guess the reference comes from seeing the goat sign on the author's yearly trip from the University of Chicago to his summer home at Seeley Lake, Montana. This goat works for the story the way the eyes of Dr. T. J. Eckleburg worked for F. Scott Fitzgerald in The Great Gatsby.

So, this building, built from a kitbashed railroad car, is true to a fictional prototype.

Fictional account of life in the summer of 1937

The Book by Norman Maclean (1902-1990)
A River Runs Through It
And Other Stories
Copyright 1976 by the University of Chicago Press.
A number of editions of this book are available at your local bookstore.
The book is also available on audio cassette from Audio Press read by Ivan Doing.

The film by Robert Redford
A River Runs Through It [PG]
The movie staring, Craig Sheffer, Brad Pitt, Tom Skerritt,Brenda Blethyn and Emily Lloyd is based on the book by Norman Maclean, screenplay by Richard Friedenberg. .
Released by Columbia Pictures,this film is available on video by Columbia Tristar Home Video.

Maclean's Second Book
Young Men and Fire
This book was published posthumously by the University of Chicago Press in 1992.
It is also available on audio cassette from NorthWord Press Inc read by Norman's son, John Maclean, at the Maclean family summer home at Seeley Lake Montana.

These pages are supported by the Multi Media Work Group.