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Despite appearances, perhaps, The Gobbler – an iconic Mid-century Modern supper club in Johnson Creek, halfway between Milwaukee and Madison – is a survivor.
Though it's endured bouts of inactivity – and its accompanying motel is now long gone – the turkey-shaped roadside curiosity keeps coming back for more.
After its most recent iteration as a seemingly viable music venue was clubbed by the pandemic, The Gobbler now has new owners, who plan to have it up and running again by June.
In order for that to happen says General Manager Jon Kaiser, it just a matter of, “pretty much getting the acts booked. When we say it's almost turnkey (I see what he did there) that's what we mean because it really is in great shape.”
Kaiser – who has experience booking live music in a number of Wisconsin venues and will do the booking of country, classic rock, jazz, cover bands and comedians himself – points out the specifics...
“(The previous owner) he put in all the (stadium seating) chairs, that sound system is brand new, top of the line. A lot of the equipment was all (recently) installed.”
But, thankfully, there’s still a lot that’s original to the 1969 supper club, including the classic MCM padded chairs on wheels in both pink and purple and the matching padded bar.
And, yes, the "carousel" bar still rotates.
”It's a nice novelty to have,” Kaiser says. “They used to say that a gentleman would tell his wife, ‘I'm gonna go down to The Gobbler.’ Or two turns, depending on how long you're going to be there.”
I asked Kaiser if we could turn it on.
“Right now?”
“Yeah."
“Well, I haven't done it yet, so let's give it a shot!”
And, yes, folks, I can confirm – and have video to prove – that you soon will again be able to go to The Gobbler for a turn.
The Gobbler was the idea of a local farmer who tapped a Fort Atkinson-based architect to create a motel and supper club that was so distinctive it became something for drivers on the newly completed I-94 between Madison and Milwaukee to stop and marvel at.
Some sources say Clarence Hartwig was looking for an exit ramp from his family turkey farm and processing business, which may have been possible as he shut down the business in 1971, not long after The Gobbler opened, citing excessive costs of upgrading his processing facility to conform to new USDA standards.
However, if he was looking to get away from the turkey business he perhaps should’ve told his architect not to design a building that looks like space age poultry. And he perhaps wouldn’t have made turkey the main focus of the menu of his supper club.
The architect was Estonian-born Helmut Ajango, who had an office in Fort Atkinson, and was affectionately known as Mike.
Born in Voru in 1931, Ajango attended grammar and middle school in his hometown before fleeing from Estonia when the Soviet Union replaced Germany as occupiers.
In 1949, after completing high school in West Germany, Ajango and his family moved to the United States. He earned degrees in art and mathematics at Wittenberg University, in Springfield, Ohio, in 1953 and another in architectural engineering in 1958 from the University of Illinois in Urbana.
Ajango – who married his wife Martha in 1953 – served as a meteorologist for the U.S. Army during the Korean War and upon his return became a citizen. The Ajangos had three children.
During his time in Springfield, Ajango worked as a draftsman for four years in the office of architect Marlay W. Lethley. From 1954 to 1958, he was chief designer at Creative Buildings Inc. in Urbana.
Moving to Fort Atkinson in 1958, Ajango served in that same role at Waterman, Fuge, Associates Architects, Engineers until 1962, when he opened his own office.
In 1966, Ajango studied architecture in Europe for six months on a Plym Fellowship from the University of Illinois.
Two years later, he rejoined his former employers as an equal partner, buying into Waterman, Fuge & Ajango, Inc. Architects, Engineers. He had his office at 108 N. Main St.
Ajango described his office's work as a “general practice” that “includes, but is not limited to architecture in general and the following in specific: architectural, structural design; planning; special studies; working drawings; specifications and systems; interior design; inspection; and contract administration.”
A hands-on architect, Ajango, on his website, noted that he himself “does personally or is personally in charge of all architectural design, interior design, planning, aesthetics and structural design, for every project his office is commissioned for.”
Ajango’s work was heavily rooted in what is now called Mid-century Modern architecture, often with references to Prairie Style work, notably in his own home in Fort Atkinson.
Among his many projects were apartments (1970), as well as The Fireside Theater (1964) in Fort Atkinson, and reportedly more than 175 churches in Wisconsin (though only five are included in the Wisconsin Architecture and History Inventory).
His churches were often very unique, like Christ The King (7750 N. 60th St.) in Milwaukee and Mount Pleasant Church Racine – both with fellow Fort Atkinson architect Gene LaMuro. The latter – similar in massing to Wright’s Annunciation Greek Orthodox Church in Milwaukee – has long been known by locals as the “spaceship church.”
One of the most touching works in his oeuvre is a memorial completed in 2001 in Tartu, Estonia that rests atop the mass grave of 192 Estonians murdered by Russians in 1941.
Ajango won an international competition in 1989 to design the memorial.
“It’s fantastic that they allowed me to do this,” Ajango told the Jefferson Daily Union at the time. “For a country architect from Fort Atkinson to be allowed to dedicate something for the entire 60,000 is humbling.”
Ajango died in 2013.
"On a day-to-day basis, we as humans come in contact with an environment which is 90 percent man-made,” he wrote in his mission statement on his firm’s website. “This influences us tremendously in how we react to it, consciously and more importantly, subconsciously.
“Being such an overwhelming factor in the overall scope of our environment, we dare not let it be ugly, confusing, irritating, ‘user unfriendly,’ mellow, dull or unimaginative. Our lives are full of these as is.
“As architects, it is our almost sacred duty to counter these with the opposites, through the use of the tools at our disposal: the bricks and mortar, this to a point where it becomes almost a mission."
His design for Hartwig’s project was anything but mellow, dull or unimaginative.
The 16,544-square-foot supper club building has two main parts. A circular, domed "body" structure with a broad, sweeping arched "neck" portion on the front, all adorned with windows that some say resemble turkey’s eyes.
Together these form that space-age turkey look.
The exterior was partially whitewashed and partially covered in stone veneer.
Inside, passing through a low entrance – where some of the exterior stone continues and where there is a large fountain – and then a corridor, one reaches the domed area, experiencing a classic Wright-ian compression and release.
At the center of the space is a circular bar with pink and purple swivel chairs that sit on a ring that rotates around the fixed central work area of the bar, doing a full round in about an hour and a half.
The rest of the space is now filled with auditorium-style seating, but originally had tables and chairs for the supper club patrons. The former kitchen has since been converted to a stage.
The ceiling of the dome has a series of ribs that radiate from the center point. The center of the dome is glass and has lighting that changes color.
In the lower level is a space with another bar that has served as a party room and a second venue for live music.
One owner avers that Willie Nelson performed on the stage down here in 1969 for $600, though I was unable to confirm that.
The corridor down here has some wild pink and silver wallpaper that the current owners believe is original. Behind the bar, you can spy the machinery that makes the bar upstairs spin.
Remnants of the original purple shag carpeting can still be seen downstairs, too, in a nook that holds a shell-shaped phone booth.
Also on the property sat an equally unique 49-room motel that also had a round pavilion-style wing, with prominent 7-shaped supports, and a pool.
It was completed a year after the supper club.
“The Gobbler Motel is a new and exciting experience in good living,” a brochure boasted, “a quiet escape into a world of color and convenience – intimate luxury in a way you’ve never had it before.”
The rooms were a sight to see. Like the “Passion Pit” with its round bed and curved overhang that almost resembled a seashell.
There was a “Sweetheart Room” with a water bed, and the “romantic Purple Luxury Room.” Other rooms were dubbed “Feather Fluff” and “Tender Trap.”
“Select either Countryside or Poolside Rooms,” the brochure continued, “catering to your desire for a spacious view or being close to the pool. There are sunken baths, king-sized water beds, color TV, satellite TV and direct-dial telephones to fit your individual needs, plus a game room, tennis court, shuffleboard, miniature golf, ping pong and sauna facilities.
“Designed to complement the famous Gobbler Supper Club, the motel is an adventure in architecture. ... (on) 50 acres of ‘Gobblerland’ on which to roam, a hill for sledding or skiing, and plenty of room for snowmobiling and mini bike riding (bring your own vehicles).”
In the late 1970s, room rates ranged from about $55 to about $85 a night.
Over the years, The Gobbler had its share of drama, beyond whatever might’ve been happening in the Passion Pit and the Feather Fluff.
In 1972, two women bartenders complained to the state that they were forced to wear revealing fishnet stockings and V-neck jackets when the men could wear pants and tuxedo jackets.
In 1981, the Sentinel reported later, “William C. Hartwig, a son of Clarence Hartwig, was charged with extortion, making a bomb threat, burglary and theft. Jefferson County authorities and the FBI alleged that he tried to extort money from the family corporation, and that he stole a semitrailer truck filled with turkeys from a poultry farm then owned by the family.”
A judge later deemed him mentally incompetent to stand trial, the paper added.
Then, in late May 1992, it was announced that The Gobbler supper club and motel would both close on July 26.
The last iteration of the motel building was as King Arthur’s Inn Motel, which operated from 1995 until 2001, when the building was left empty. The Johnson Creek Fire Department later burned it down as a live burn exercise for firefighters.
However, its concrete foundation slab remained on the site until 2019. The following year, The View at Johnson Creek Assisted Living and Memory Care Community, with 56 apartments for up to 64 residents, was built there.
Over at the old supper club, there were attempts over the years to do something, including a barbecue restaurant in the late 1990s.
In 2015, then-owner Daniel Manesis spent $2.7 million to convert the place into a live music venue, removing the old 70,000-pound Roost dining area and dance floor that had been suspended about 8 feet above the bar since the early 1970s and converting the old kitchen into a stage.
This is also when the stadium seating was added. Manesis also added some backstage green rooms for performers.
The story of how West Allis-based Manesis came to own the theater is an interesting one.
While shopping with his wife at the Johnson Creek Premium Outlets on the opposite side of I-94 in 2014, Manesis spied The Gobbler, which he remembered from his days in Madison not long after the place opened.
Impressed with the condition, especially considering how long it had been closed, Manesis bought it for $635,000, leading his wife to quip that her purchase at the mall was the most expensive purse she’d ever bought.
In December 2015, The Gobbler reopened and hosted comedy, Christian music and country concerts, with the likes of Ronnie Milsap, LeAnn Rimes, “The Voice” winner Danielle Bradbery, country duo Maddie & Tae, Eli Young Band and others performing there.
After Covid-19 shuttered the place in 2020, Manesis died in 2021 and a potential sale in 2023 fell apart, The Gobbler, it seemed, was closed for good.
Not so fast.
Recently, new owners spent $1.2 million on the place and now have plans to reopen it as a performance venue this summer.
It is owned by Ladysmith-based Kaiser, Milwaukee native Jim Weatherly (now living in Scottsdale), and Nidhi Mishra and Paul Bensman, who are based in the Detroit area.
“I remember, in the early ‘70s, going there for dinner at the supper club,” Weatherly recalls of hearing the place was for sale. “And I thought, well, you know, loving sort of old iconic things like I do, and it was in that music realm, it started to pique my interest.
“I thought this would be something really cool to get this thing back up and and running.”
Weatherly says he also saw the site as valuable as a potential real estate investment.
“Because it's on just about 10 acres, and also do some real estate investments in Milwaukee and I’m working with my son on some of his real estate investments, I thought, they're not going to build any more dirt out on that exit by the outlet mall.
“The price was what I thought was a really good way of getting into it, and then try to get the music back cranking there and get people in Milwaukee, Madison and the expanding suburbs, Oconomowoc and Jefferson County – that whole area – excited about it, be part of the community.”
The community is clearly interested. Before I leave, Kaiser says, “You’ve got to see this,” and emerges from his office with a small gift bag.
“Last week, I show up to the doors and somebody had left a little gift bag.”
Inside was a ticket stub from a 1977 concert at The Gobbler and a small bottle of The Gobbler-labeled pink champagne, with a note that read, “from a former employee of The Gobbler."
Kaiser and Weatherly and their team have some work to do to get the place ready, and because of that the former says that the opening date remains flexible.
“If I say mid-June, that's a loose goal,” he tells me. “We want the first couple of shows to set the tone for what we're going to be. We'd rather eat a month of operational expenses than put something out there that’s less than what we want.
“We want that opening weekend to be a home run.”
Born in Brooklyn, N.Y., where he lived until he was 17, Bobby received his BA-Mass Communications from UWM in 1989 and has lived in Walker's Point, Bay View, Enderis Park, South Milwaukee and on the East Side.
He has published three non-fiction books in Italy – including one about an event in Milwaukee history, which was published in the U.S. in autumn 2010. Four more books, all about Milwaukee, have been published by The History Press. A fifth collects Urban Spelunking articles about breweries and maltsters.
With his most recent band, The Yell Leaders, Bobby released four LPs and had a songs featured in episodes of TV's "Party of Five" and "Dawson's Creek," and films in Japan, South America and the U.S. The Yell Leaders were named the best unsigned band in their region by VH-1 as part of its Rock Across America 1998 Tour. Most recently, the band contributed tracks to a UK vinyl/CD tribute to the Redskins and collaborated on a track with Italian novelist Enrico Remmert.
He's produced three installments of the "OMCD" series of local music compilations for OnMilwaukee.com and in 2007 produced a CD of Italian music and poetry.
In 2005, he was awarded the City of Asti's (Italy) Journalism Prize for his work focusing on that area. He has also won awards from the Milwaukee Press Club.
He has been heard on 88Nine Radio Milwaukee talking about his "Urban Spelunking" series of stories, in that station's most popular podcast.
