In 1967, three years after opening on Hubbard Street, Billy expands into an adjoining space to the west that had been a parking ramp. He hires workmen to put up wood paneling on the walls, and for one day at least, as Sun-Times columnist Tom Fitzpatrick describes it, the place “looked like your classic suburban recreation room.”
In this new room, with a champagne and caviar party, Billy unveils the Wall of Fame, dominated at its center by a hand-drawn portrait of Billy that dwarfs the photos on either side. These are the faces of 37 men and one woman who were once top-ranking newspaper editors, reporters and columnists; a couple of television personalities and one newspaper publisher; one mayor and a man who was the chauffeur for a Tribune editor.
There is probably not a person alive who can identify all of these faces.
He wrote here. He drank here. He still lives here.
“I miss Mike very much,” Sam says in May 2000. “I see Mike three, four times. Matter of fact, I see him three days ago. Mike come by here. It was when he was dead. I ask him if he remembers when I said, ‘Mike, if anything ever happen to me, I want you to keep the Billy Goat name alive.’ And he nods his head and I tell him, ‘Now that you are gone I am going to keep your name alive. I’m going to make sure your name will live forever.’”
On April 29th 1997, we lost a great Chicagoan and friend in Mike Royko. Some thought it would mark the end of an era. However, his legacy of hard work and integrity inspired a whole new generation of writers and reporters. They still come to the Billy Goat everyday to understand what it means to be a real Chicago journalist.
“I miss Mike very much,” Sam says in May 2000. “I see Mike three, four times. Matter of fact, I see him three days ago. Mike come by here. It was when he was dead. I ask him if he remembers when I said, ‘Mike, if anything ever happen to me, I want you to keep the Billy Goat name alive.’ And he nods his head and I tell him, ‘Now that you are gone I am going to keep your name alive. I’m going to make sure your name will live forever.’”
in 1991, President Bush came to Billy Goat for a visit and to meet Sam.
Sam calls Mike and excitedly tells his assistant over the phone, “The president wants to know if Mike is here. I tell him no and then he wants to know where he usually sits and I show him and he seems very excited to see where he site when he comes down here.”
Sam wants Mike to have a burger with Bush. Hes says no. Sam calls Mike’s wide, Judy. Shes wants him to go. He says no. Mike often refers to Bush as “the greatest tourist of our time,” and in the next day’s Tribune writes, “The country is going to hell in a hand basket, and the president of the United States wants to know on what part of the bar I rest my elbows? Or forehead?”
Royko’s Raiders deliver another trophy – Mike Royko (back row, second from right), Don DeBat (back row, third from left), Tim Weigel (front row, far right)
