The Downtown Tavern: Where The Past Coalesces with the Present

Story by Gabe Hart
Photos by Mirza Babic

It’s 3:00 on a cold and rainy February afternoon — two days before Valentine’s Day, to be exact. The rain is incessant, and parking is sparse on North Liberty Street in Downtown Jackson. I circle the block a few times before finding a vacancy on the east side of North Church Street, the rain still slanting in sheets. I sprint across North Church, cradling my computer between my bicep and forearm like a running back darting in and out of defenders. 

I throttle down as I approach the front door, the unmistakable electric blue of the wooden sign marking my arrival. At this exact moment, a strange feeling hits me — a mixture of deja vu and a hazy dream, something real but not. An incandescent memory that’s more like a feeling. Maybe it’s both. 

There was a time in my life when arriving at The Downtown Tavern at 3:00 on a weekday afternoon was normal. There were days when my friend Jon and I would wait on the wooden bench outside the bar until the owner, Molly Parker, showed up to open it. We’d take our seats in our usual spot (facing the door to see who came and went), wait for the rest of our group to arrive, and stay well past the light outside turned dark. 

Today, though, I’m not here to drink; I’m here to have a conversation.

Because our memories like to pave over the potholes of reality, I don’t think of the hangovers that would be waiting for me the mornings after those afternoons turned into late nights. When I remember those times, it’s through a dream-like haze of smoke, bourbon, and live music, surrounded by friends and regulars. But the reality in which those dreams were formed isn’t as malleable as my memories are. The truth of what The Downtown Tavern was and is — from its closing to its reopening to finally being recognized as one of the best dive bars in the state — is a reality that is harsh, unforgiving, and fraught with challenges. That reality is why it takes someone tough as hell to keep it all going. Enter Melanie Lupino.

Melanie is no stranger to the bar scene in Jackson — and beyond. 

“I was working at Cafe Lafayette when it burned down in July of 2004 and came straight to the Tavern for a job,” she recalled. “Stayed there for not even six months, went out with a bang, and got a job at Barley’s.”

Barley’s would eventually close, sending Melanie to the mountains in Denver to tend bar and eventually the southernmost point in the United States — Key West — a concrete foreshadowing of the highs and lows she would experience on the way to finally owning the Tavern and the building where the business has always called home. The irony of all of it, though, is that owning any bar wasn’t ever Melanie’s dream.

“When my Barley’s days were winding down, I made it a point to tell anyone who would listen that I would never own a bar,” she recalled. 

Time and life have their own ways of changing our plans.

Despite Melanie’s declaration, she bought The Downtown Tavern near the end of 2019, not knowing that the world would be turned upside down a few months later.

The beginnings of things always hold the most promise — the dreams, the aspirations, the hopes, all an oasis from the drudgery of the mundane. But the work to make those dreams a reality? Well, that’s where this story gets real.

To anyone who has had the privilege of enjoying a drink or two on North Liberty Street, the Tavern’s building and business are inseparable. The aesthetics of the building are just as crucial to the brand as the name itself. The high ceilings, dim lights, and backlit bar paint the full picture of what makes The Downtown Tavern the most unique bar in West Tennessee, but the building and the brand weren’t always under the same ownership. 

As long as the Tavern existed, whoever owned the business had to rent the building. Over the course of two decades, the Tavern has survived changes in ownership, literal fences being built to keep patrons off the patio, and developers from near and far who have tried to pull the rug out from under ownership by attempting to buy the building. But owning the building wasn’t even on Melanie’s radar when she purchased the business. There was too much work to do to think that far ahead.

One of the distinct qualities of the Tavern is that it’s one of only a few places where smoking is still allowed inside. Even as someone who has never smoked, I’ve always enjoyed this aspect of the bar; it’s simultaneously charming and gritty. But for Melanie, cleaning the space once she bought the business was a labor of love that made her never want to smoke another cigarette again.

“I stripped 11 years of nicotine off the walls,” she said. “I scrubbed the ceiling with a sponge over and over during a 48-hour period. When I scrubbed the nicotine off the walls, I could only scrub one square foot at a time. Up to that point, I had smoked for 18 years, but scrubbing all that nicotine made me quit.”

When the nicotine was finally scrubbed, the walls were painted, and enhancements to the HVAC unit were made. The bar itself was getting the internal upgrades that were long overdue, but deep cleaning the space was only the beginning.

One of the most striking features of the Tavern is the backlit backbar. On the shelves sit a plethora of bottles — the liquid inside each one glowing like an elixir. The lighting from the backbar adds a warm vibe to the space that envelops patrons as soon as they sidle up to the counter to order their drinks. If a building has a soul, the backbar is the Tavern’s, but when the business closed in 2019, the original backbar went with it.

“I built the backbar myself and stained it 17 times,” Melanie explained. “When I bought the business, the whole backbar had been dismantled; I had to build it back.”

Once the cornerstone of the Tavern was back in place, the cleaning continued — the walls, the ceiling, the floors, and every inch of wood in the bar. And while the transformation was taking place, everyone’s lives came to a screeching halt. 

In early spring of 2020, COVID-19 hit, and businesses closed. Even after establishments were allowed to reopen, people were wary of returning to crowded spaces. Through all the tumult of a pandemic and rebuild, the Tavern eventually reopened in June of 2021 — nearly two years after Melanie purchased the business.

A lot changed for everyone between late 2019 and mid-2021, myself included. I quit drinking, and memories of the Tavern started to congeal and fade the way dreams do the morning after — a slow dissipation of images and feelings. When news of the reopening hit my social media feed in the summer of 2021, I was happy for Melanie, the bar, and the regulars, but I knew a lot of that world was in my rearview mirror. A few months ago, however, I found myself paying a 20 dollar cover to help raise money to once again keep the Tavern open. 

Because the business of the Tavern and the building that houses it are seamlessly interwoven, simply owning the business has always been a precarious proposition. Last fall, the possibility of the building being sold came dangerously close to becoming a reality. A buyer emerged to place a bid on the building with seemingly no intention of keeping the Tavern. Thankfully, Melanie had the foresight to work language into her lease contract in 2019 that allowed her to match any offer. 

“When I first signed the lease to rent the building, I was smart enough to put in a ‘right of first refusal’ should someone offer to buy the building,” she recalled. “A few months ago, someone offered, and I had to try and match the offer or give up the business, and there was no way I was doing that. Selling was not an option; it’s still not an option.”

If you’ve ever met Melanie Lupino, you know she’s tough; it’s not an act. Her fight and determination are the reasons the Tavern still resides at 208 N. Liberty Street, and no investor, developer, or pandemic could stop her. I asked Melanie if she ever considered giving up owning the bar and the building, and her answer was declarative and definitive.

“Hell. No.”

On December 21, 2023, nearly four years after she purchased the business, Melanie officially bought the building, completing her four-year odyssey. She also partnered with photographer Mirza Babic to ramp up the promotion of the Tavern. Mirza’s ability to capture an image in motion or through film is a talent that has allowed the Tavern to propel its image far beyond West Tennessee. In February, The Downtown Tavern was included on the list of The 18 Best Dive Bars in Tennessee. 

I asked Melanie if finally owning the business and the building felt like a dream come true and if her dream had always been to own the Tavern. Always authentic to herself, Melanie’s answer was the same.

“I bought The Tavern because I hated having a boss. You can’t clock me in at Costco and expect me to be Employee of the Month.”

And maybe that IS the dream — the freedom to live your life in the way that makes you the happiest.

Two weeks after our conversation that rainy afternoon, I returned to the Tavern to drink. I wanted to see if it was truly as magical as my memory told me it was. 

My plan was to sit in the same pew I would sit in when my friends and I would spend hours drinking, talking, and listening to music all those years ago. I wanted to sip my bourbon and listen to Ben Jessie, but when I walked to the end of the bar to order my drink, I stayed. Mirza was pouring drinks. The crowd was ample for a Thursday night, and more people filed through the door the longer I stayed. I kept glancing at my old seat across the bar and realized how many things had changed…and the one constant that remained.

My friends and I don’t see each other much anymore; half of the original group doesn’t even live in Tennessee now. Instead of Grayson, Molly, or Josh pouring my drinks, Mirza was topping my glass off. And, of course, the ownership has shifted over the years — Molly to Walt and Michelle and now to Melanie — bringing the ebbs and flows of consistency with each change. But the bourbon still hit like I remembered. The hazy smoke still hung in the lightest of fog as I looked across the room each time the door opened and closed. And even if it was never Melanie’s dream to buy a bar — to own The Downtown Tavern — every person who has ever set foot in that place is glad she did. 

If physical spaces are the conservators of ghosts and memories, the Tavern is Fort Knox. A space where dreams of the past coalesce with realities of the present under one roof, one name, and one address — The Downtown Tavern. 208 N. Liberty Street.