WATERTOWN, N.Y. (WWNY) – One of the first bars to receive a liquor license in Watertown reopened Saturday, the first drink ordered by the son of the man who started the business nearly 100 years ago.
After six months of work and a new owner, Saturday Colesante’s reopened its doors to a swarm of people. The first drink ordered by the original owner’s son, George Colesante.
Colesante’s opened in 1933, the same year Prohibition ended. It is one of the first bars to receive a liquor license in the Watertown area.
Although new owner Dan Fraser says he had to get a new liquor license, he says the name and heritage of Colesante’s hasn’t changed. That’s why George Colesante had the first drink.
“We were going to open on Thursday,” Fraser said. “We said, ‘No, we’re not opening. We’ll wait until Saturday so George can buy the first beer.'”
“I didn’t expect to have this many people,” Colesante said. “I haven’t had a bar that big in fifty, sixty years, I don’t think. I don’t remember it anyway. There were a lot of people in there.”
The first glass of Colesante? Fireball.
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