No matter what they called it, the place operated at full tilt.
Patrons enjoyed tasty food, live music, intoxicating drinks and a better-than-even chance of losing their money at one of the most popular gambling resorts of the Portage Lakes.
The house usually won.
Known as Riley’s, Duffy’s, Lindy’s and a handful of lesser-known names, the swanky establishment developed a certain notoriety because it skirted laws for years with minimum interference from Summit County authorities.
The tavern packed in high-rolling crowds from the 1930s to the 1950s on Portage Lakes Drive in Coventry Township. Some people went for a piece of the action. Others just wanted a Boston strip steak and baked potato.
On any given night, excitement and danger lingered in the smoke-filled atmosphere. Would there be a winner? Would there be a raid?
The resort began innocently as a luxury hotel in the early 20th century. Frank Crooks, former operator of the Turkeyfoot Lake Clubhouse, opened Crooks’ Hotel in 1904 on the southeast shore of tranquil Long Lake. Visitors arrived by water launch or horse-drawn buggy to enjoy a summer respite at the peaceful inn.
The hotel specialized in fish and chicken dinners for 25 cents. Among its famous guests were inventor Thomas A. Edison, tenor Evan Williams and boxer Kid McCoy.
In July 1920, Crooks closed the hotel and leased the building to Akron’s Oakland Club, which turned the resort into its summer home. The renamed Oakland Country Club served as the setting for dances, social affairs and maybe a card game here or a stag night there.
More than a decade later, the former hotel was operating as a nightclub and casino — unofficially, of course. The identities of proprietors were a guarded secret until William Riley Jerrel slapped his middle name on the business.
Tall, husky and gregarious, Jerrel transformed Riley’s Tavern into a flashy, raucous landmark. He opened the “Rumpus Room,” a gambling annex with roulette, blackjack, poker, slot machines and dice games, and spent the next decade playing cat and mouse with authorities.
“At Riley’s on Portage Lakes Drive, you begin to sense a different atmosphere as soon as you drive into the parking lot and have to park yourself and stumble through the dark to two beacon lights,” Beacon Journal reporter Kenny Nichols wrote in 1939.
“The beacon lights are on either side of an arched doorway which when opened, lead into a vestibule off which open two more doors. Through one door’s three tiny panes of glass peeps the visage of a gent who is just the type for Hollywood mug roles. He opens the door if you look all right.”
Patrons were ushered to a modern bar with chrome-and-leather stools and brightly colored shelves of bottles. It was anyone’s guess if the club had a liquor license. The certificate often was allowed to lapse with no repercussions.
After a few drinks, customers returned to the vestibule where the doorman unlocked the “Rumpus Room,” basically an enclosed porch 20 feet long and 10 feet wide.
“A horsey-looking fellow in shirt sleeves, apron, green eyeshade, and all the other accoutrements of the veteran gamesman is holding forth over the dice table for two people,” Nichols wrote.
“At the other side of the room, a young fellow in a faultless double-breasted tux stands at the ready behind three tables that offer a choice of roulette, blackjack and chuck-a-luck.”
About that fellow in the tuxedo: He may have been someone famous — or at least someone destined for fame. One of the employees at Riley’s Tavern in the late 1930s and early 1940s was a Steubenville native named Dino Paul Crocetti.
Crocetti earned $125 per week as a Riley’s croupier, gathering chips and dropping the ball on the roulette wheel. In a few years, he changed his name to Dean Martin and became a famous nightclub entertainer and movie star.
In 1946, Jerrel sold Riley’s for $40,000 to Sam and Mitchell Braun, owners of the Musical Bar in Akron. Eddie Mirman, owner of a Manchester Road grocery, ran the place. The name changed to Duffy’s.
State liquor agents raided the business several times, confiscating its well-stocked shelves. After the agents left, the shelves were quickly restocked. Even on Sundays.
Duffy’s was the setting for a gangland-style holdup in 1947. Six masked men, one armed with a sawed-off shotgun, pushed their way past the doorman and robbed 25 patrons.
“I want every dime that’s in this place,” the leader snarled.
The gangsters stole wallets, rings and watches before escaping with $16,000 in loot. They never were caught.
A year later, a mysterious explosion, possibly from a grenade, damaged the wall of the gambling room about 5 a.m. Another morning, a man in a passing car tried to roll an explosive under the building, but it detonated 15 feet away.
Burglars broke into the club one night and stole $431 from a beer cooler, which turned out to be one of the better jackpots at Duffy’s. The intruders toasted their success with beer and whiskey before fleeing.
Customers often cried foul after losing money at the club. One woman got so angry when her husband lost $12,000 in a dice game that she filed a lawsuit to recoup the money from Duffy’s. She fared no better than her husband.
Casino? What casino? Deputies made half-hearted attempts at raids. Sheriff Robert L. Smith was a friend of Mirman, who had a contract for food deliveries at the Summit County Courthouse.
“We have had no complaints about gambling at Duffy’s,” Smith insisted.
He must not have talked to that one fellow’s wife!
When authorities finally did make a highly publicized raid on the nightspot, it was a joke. Patrons didn’t even realize the club was being raided.
Deputies confiscated old, broken gambling equipment from a separate room while the games continued in the real casino.
In the early 1950s, the newly named Lindy’s took up where Duffy’s left off. William “Sonny” Lea and Riley Jerrel took control. Joe Garcia, a former deputy, served as proprietor.
“It’s conduct like yours that leads to remarks on the street that people at the courthouse have their hands out,” Common Pleas Judge Rank H. Harvey once scolded Garcia.
The biggest improvement at Lindy’s was long overdue. The remodeled casino was moved upstairs and accessed through a hidden staircase in an empty chamber off the lounge.
Every night, the parking lot was filled with automobiles. The Boston strip steaks were good, but not THAT good.
Despite occasional raids and frequent indictments, business continued until April 2, 1954, when a powerful explosion tore through the building at 5:18 a.m. Smoke drifted over Long Lake as a fire burned the old hotel to the ground.
Damage was estimated at $65,000, but there was only $6,000 in insurance on the building.
Initially, investigators thought the fire was caused by a newly installed oil furnace. Then they realized that the blaze originated 30 feet away from the furnace.
The suspicious fire was the final raid on the resort.
Over the past 60 years, Ohio has legalized just about everything that used to be a crime at the Portage Lakes tavern. The proprietors of Riley’s, Duffy’s and Lindy’s were ahead of their time. The state probably owes them a belated apology.
Copy editor Mark J. Price is author of The Rest Is History: True Tales From Akron’s Vibrant Past, a book from the University of Akron Press. He can be reached at 330-996-3850 or mjprice@thebeaconjournal.com.