You could write an entire book on The Only Café.
After my interview with The Only’s owner Jerome Ackhurst as part of its 25th anniversary celebration, I had a lot of conversations about what The Only means to the community, and listened to story after story of memorable moments spent in the beloved local landmark.
Seems everybody has stories about The Only Café. Here are two more of them.
“I’ve watched people fall in love and out of love behind this bar,” says local artist and former bartender Bill Batten. “I’ve watched people’s careers be made. I’ve watched people go through terrible tragedies, but be surrounded by people again and have come through it. I’ve been nursed through a couple of them myself in this place. I’ve fallen in love behind this bar.”
Remembered for his keen wit, cut-off shorts, and the cigarette hanging out of his mouth as he cooked food and cleaned the grill, Bill was a familiar face at The Only Café throughout the 1990s and into the 2000s.
Currently making a living full time as an artist, Bill’s presence in The Only continues with some of his artwork hanging prominently in the bar to this day — including a painting of Jerome and former staff members.
“The Only seemed like it had been here forever from the moment it opened. It seemed inevitable,” Bill says. “My reaction from when I started working here was that this is the place that I’d open. Jerome beat me to the punch.”
“As an artist, it was a great place to network and to let people know who you are. It was a great place to live the art school life forever.”
Andrea Barrett echoes Bill’s statements about how much staff observe behind the bar.
“You get to know people. You serve them at night, you see them hook up, and then you serve them breakfast the next morning. You see a lot. ”
Employed at The Only on and off for 23 years, Andrea holds the record for working at The Only longer than any other server. Between working at St. Vernous and doing some private catering, Andrea still works a few days a week at The Only.
“One of the things about only being at The Only two or three days a week is that in this industry it’s nice to do different things,” Andrea says. “I really enjoy cooking. I think I’m not bad on a Sunday. When you’re only here a couple of days a week, it’s not exhausting and you can be friendly towards people.”
Of course, both Bill and Andrea are open about The Only’s past reputation of having some of the meanest service in town.
“We are not unaware of the reputation of The Only Café and its service, which has gone through waves over time,” Andrea laughs. “I remember being absolutely terrified when I first started coming here. I was a scared customer, but that changed.”
“There were two parts to The Only attitude,” Bill explains. “The first is that there are only two people working behind the bar, but a lot more customers. If you’re in that much of a hurry, then you’re in the wrong place. People would be snapping their fingers, so that’s where you couldn’t take any shit or you’d get run over. So you clamp down on it really quick.”
“The second was that, unlike other serving jobs, at The Only you were not trained to be invisible,” Bill adds. “The ratio of the floor space to counter space was all too wrong.”
“One thing about being behind the bar was that there was nowhere to hide,” Andrea affirms. “So if you were watching your boyfriend flirting with somebody else, or were having a really bad day, or were heartbroken, you were on stage and there was nowhere to go. Everybody could see you.”
But the prominence of The Only’s staff behind the bar has always made them as memorable as individuals as The Only is as an institution.
“The first day behind the bar, Jerome pointed at the floor boards behind the bar and asked ‘What is that?’,” Bill recalls. ” I said ‘The running board’. Jerome said ‘That’s the stage. No matter what you do, don’t be yourself behind the bar. You won’t have a personal life and you’ll be eaten alive and get spat out in a hurry. Choose a character. Become the character behind the bar.’ For me, that was easy. My name is Bill — just add a ‘Wild’ in front of it.”
Andrea has her own memories of early interactions with Jerome as an employer.
“What constituted a job interview with Jerome was ‘When are you available?’ and ‘Can you flip an egg?’. I didn’t eat eggs, but I said ‘Sure, I can flip an egg’. Apparently, I can flip an egg. That’s how it started.”
“One thing that Jerome has always been good about is that everything is good quality,” Andrea continues.
“The ham is always really good, and the gouda is really great gouda. Sometimes the portions are enormous. I think people consistently know they are going to get really good food, but there are a lot of other options. Jerome is amazing about saying ‘If you want to make a special, make a special.’ He doesn’t question prices or costs. If I said ‘I feel like making a meatless lasagna today’, I would make it and people would come in and eat it.”
Bill agrees that a big part of The Only’s success has to do with the food menu — as well as the beer selection.
“The Only has been popular for 25 years now because the beer fridge is always fun to explore, the menu is kick ass, and it’s not a place that’s going to rush you through your experience. It’s made for lingering. You can nurse a cup of coffee or you can power drink and nobody is going to look twice at you as if you are taking up space.”
“Back in the nineties, The Only was the defacto meeting place, much like cafés would have been in Paris when Modernism was born,” Bill continues. “You had the local business community coming in, and rednecks and the hippie community, and we’re all sitting at the same tables. In other places, you might be rolling out into the streets fighting. At the Only you’d be arguing and debating ideas of all disciplines, but buying rounds for each other. So these communities were all linked too, which was also a very cool thing.”
Andrea has her own story about how The Only can bring different people together.
“About a year ago, there was this older couple who came in,” Andrea recalls. “The woman was here to pick up her father’s ashes to drive them back to the east coast. They had a couple of pints, ordered the lunch special, and we started yip yapping. We found out that her last name was the same as mine, and they were going to the same place one of the guys sitting at the bar was about to travel to. I asked ‘How did you end up coming in here?’. She said ‘We looked in the door. We don’t like going into generic places, and this place looked really cool.'”
Bill believes the uniqueness of The Only has had a lot of influence on Peterborough’s renowned dining and drinking culture.
“The Only influenced downtown Peterborough as we know it now,” Bill explains. “It made people realize that if you have a good idea and you really work hard at it and commit to it, you don’t have to do things the normal way. It gave a lot of people the courage to try it. It made people realize that people are looking for something unique, different, and with personality.”
Anyone who has spent a lot of time at The Only knows the sense of community in the café is strong, and both Bill and Andrea have experienced moments where they have felt the love that other staff and customers have for them.
“I remember feeling really dispirited one Sunday morning,” Andrea says. “By fluke, there were a lot of regular customers in here and I said ‘I don’t think I can do this anymore’. The next Sunday people brought me presents and said ‘We can’t lose your eggs bennie on Sunday.'”
For Bill, things have been good in recent years. He recently closed a show in Toronto and Black Honey is currently featuring his work. However, that hasn’t always been the case.
“I hit bottom in 1993 with alcoholism,” Bill admits. “I lost my job, my apartment, my fiancé, my self-respect. Ten months later and completely sober, I walked back in [to The Only] to see what would happen. I was welcomed back in the most extraordinary kind and generous way.”
After 25 years, The Only Café remains a special place in our community, and the people behind the bar are like the gatekeepers of those memories. While The Only has been an important part of many people’s lives, the many staff members over the years have become just as an important part of the the culture and the appeal of this special establishment.
“There is still a feeling that you go to The Only for last call. A lot of people end their night here,” Andrea observes.
“People go away and they go to other places, but they always come back to The Only.”
