Gus Barthel and the Little Deutsche House in Broad Ripple
- Ed Fujawa
- Apr 30
- 8 min read
In the heart of Broad Ripple sits the BRICS ice cream shop which occupies the former Broad Ripple depot building since it opened in 2010. The interior of the depot is decorated with a variety of Monon railroad themed posters, maps, and photos, along with more general photos from the history of Broad Ripple. A month or so I visited BRICS to pick up a pint of their yellow cake batter ice cream, and I stopped to look at some of the photos. While I had done this in the past, I took special notice of one photo which shows an odd-looking building with a crowd of people posing out front, and a sign which reads “The When.”
A bit of research revealed that this building was a roadhouse/hotel owned by a Gus (short for Gustav[e]) Barthel, whose name appears on the side of the hotel in the image above. Long time readers of this blog know that I have covered roadhouses around Indianapolis in prior posts, including the Bellevue Roadhouse and Resort near Michigan Road and the Canal, and the various establishments in the Brighton Beach area just north of the intersection of 16th and Dr. MLK Jr. Street.
Barthel and his family originally operated butcher shops in Indianapolis, but in the late 1890s, Gus decided to branch out and established his roadhouse in Broad Ripple. Originally called “The Little Deutsche Haus,” (or Kleines Deutsches Haus as it was referred to in the local German newspaper) the Indianapolis News reported on February 15, 1899, that the “club house is a first-class, exclusive family resort, with private dining room, dancing hall, bowling alleys, etc.” The resort also boasted a steamboat landing to accommodate the various steamboats which operated out of Broad Ripple Park and offered boats to rent for use on the river. No mention is made of the alcoholic beverages which were also offered at the resort, as the roadhouse did also feature a bar, a fact conveniently left out of the announcement in the News.
However, Barthel was not the luckiest of people in Broad Ripple, and his establishment suffered multiple fires over the early years of its operation. The first, happened just a few weeks after the roadhouse opened, on March 3. The fire was discovered in the evening (reports indicated different times, including 6 pm or 8 pm) and apparently started in the attic of the wood framed roadhouse. Barthel’s son and several employees rushed up to the attic but found the access door locked. Once the door was broken open, the flames were found to be too great, and the group retreated out of the building.
While some furniture and other items were saved by onlookers, the roadhouse itself was a total loss. Barthel immediately declared that the fire had been intentionally set and told the News that he had received threats against him and the roadhouse. He also noted that a woman who had spoken at a recent Pentecostal revival meeting held nearby just before the roadhouse was to open had predicted that the building “would someday be in ashes.” The insurance coverage on the building was $4,000, with the loss estimated at $10,000. Barthel pledged to rebuild.
And rebuild he did and by that summer The Little Deutsche Haus was back up and operating. In early. August the Indianapolis News ran an advertisement for the “new, popular, and refined” Little Deutsche Haus. The ad also noted that “[w]heels taken care of free,” meaning those who bicycled to. the roadhouse would have their bikes parked and secured during their visit. This was during the bicycle craze of the late 1890s and early 1900s, and Barthel’s location in Broad Ripple was at the northern terminus of the Central Canal Tow Path, a popular route for bicyclists, who frequented the roadhouse.
While the Little Deutsche Haus (the second one, for those counting) was popular over the summer, in early September another fire struck. The Indianapolis Sun reported that “[a] large supply of wines and liquors stored in the cellar was ruined,” and that in addition to being popular with bicyclists, the clubhouse was a meeting place for gamblers. Barthel claimed the fire was caused by his “enemies,” and that the local populace objected to the establishment because of the liquor, bicyclists, and gambling. The fire had once again begun in the attic of the Little Deutsche Haus and Barthel reported he smelled coal oil in the area where the fire started. He also claimed that a firefighting “apparatus,” that was installed in the clubhouse had been tampered with and did not work, preventing effort to douse the flames.
Barthel rebuilt the roadhouse, which was located on the southeast corner of where the Monon Trail crosses the canal, a final time and it appears this time it avoided a fiery end. The River House apartment building stands on this location today. The Sanborn map below, an update to the 1898 edition of the insurance map, shows the roadhouse, and its name
Barthel wasn’t just known for the Little Deutsche Haus. He was also a noted fisherman, and his exploits along the White River were often reported in local newspapers. He also would also host fishing excursions out of his establishment. Barthel also ran for sheriff of Marion County in 1905, although he lost. He and his roadhouse also had a front row seat to a massive train crash in the middle of Broad Ripple, when north and south bound trains collided head on along the stretch of track in front of the roadhouse and railroad bridge (now known as the Monon Trail) over the canal.
In 1905 and into 1906, residents of Washington Township, where Broad Ripple is located, in a fit of moral outrage of the type which pop up on occasion, passed a remonstrance to ban saloons and establishments which served alcohol. Most establishments which served alcohol closed or tried to keep a low profile and stay off the (yet to be invented) radar of local moralists and law enforcement. While this action was extremely damaging to Barthel’s business, he continued to serve alcohol and was not terribly shy about advertising that fact. A letter to the editor of the News in March of 1907 targeted Barthel, noting that he was "[t]he only persistent violator of the remonstrance in this township," and detailed how Barthel flagrantly violated the will of the alcohol hating populace, including delivering wagonfuls of alcohol to the roadhouse:
The roadhouse was the focus of raids by local law enforcement and as a result of one of these raids Barthel was charged with operating a “blind tiger,” a slang term for an establishment which illegally sells alcohol. This and the continued alcohol ban in Washington Township forced him to seek opportunities outside of the township. This led him to opening the “Wall Street Café and Bar," located at 139 East Market Street in the heart of downtown Indianapolis. The bar was not popular amongst nearby business owners, and unsurprisingly caught fire not long after its opening, which resulted in its closure. It was scheduled to reopen on December 30, 1907, but a tragedy occurred first.
On the morning of December 30, Barthel and one of his employees were waiting to catch a streetcar to Indianapolis, likely for a meeting relating to the pending “blind tiger” case. The two men were waiting for the streetcar near where College Avenue crosses the canal, when Barthel walked out onto the bridge which carried the interurban train track over the canal. He stood for a moment and then fell through a gap in the bridge’s side and into the canal. He reportedly called out "Walter!”, who was the employee accompanying him, as he fell.
Walter attempted to rescue Barthel but could not reach him and ran to a nearby home where he grabbed a ladder. He returned to the scene and found Barthel dead in the canal, his body floating on the surface. The local coroner, Dr. T.N. Bennett, who also happened to be the Barthel family doctor, opined that Gus had suffered a heart attack and believed that he was either dead before he hit the water of the canal, or within a short period after. Bottom line, he did not think Barthel drowned.
Barthel’s hotel remained in place for some period of time, although when it was demolished is unclear. The image below from 1908, not long after Barthel’s death, shows Broad Ripple from the vantage point of the intersection of what today is Guilford and Westfield Boulevard, looking east. The prominently placed brick building is the International Order of Oddfellows Hall, which still stands today, and houses the Runners Forum and the Red Room.
If you zoom in, you can still see The Little Deutsche Haus/Barthel’s Hotel to the east, at the far end of the street.
I located another pair of images of the Little Deutsche Haus on the website of the Monon Railroad Technical Society. This website featured a page with the history of the Monon Railroad around Nora and Broad Ripple (link in sources). These images are noted to be from the collection of Ken Weller, who was a member of the Monon Railroad Technical Society. It appears that Mr. Weller passed away several years ago, but his images from the website provide great views of the Little Deutsche Haus, ca. 1917, one of which is shown below. The Little Deutsche Haus is on the left side of the photo, with the bridge over the canal in the middle of the photo. This bridge still stands and carries the Monon Trail over the canal. The brick building with two windows on the far right also still stands today.
In 1922 the Indianapolis News published a two-page spread about the history of Broad Ripple in anticipation of the suburb's planned annexation into Indianapolis. An image of the "Barthel Hotel" is included in this spread as shown below. As indicated in the caption, the former roadhouse was to be converted to apartments. As noted above, the location of Barthel’s roadhouse is where the River House apartment building now stands.
There is one last issue to address about the photo on display at BRICS: What is with the sign on the front of the roadhouse which says, "The When?" My first thought was that this was the name of the establishment, but I could find no reference to Barthel's roadhouse ever being called The When. However, there was a band named the "The When Band" which was active in Indianapolis in the late 1890s and early 1900s and was advertised to have played at a wide range of venues around the county. Sure, enough, I located an advertisement from 1899 promoting the reopening of the Little Deutsche Haus (after one of the fires listed above), which featured music by The When Band. Whether the photo at BRICS was during the performance advertised here or another date is unclear, but it likely does explain why "The When" was on the front of the roadhouse.
Sources
Indianapolis Journal: March 4, 1899, July 18, 1899
Indianapolis News: February 15, 1899, March 4, 1899, August 8, 1899, February 15, 1900, April 3, 1906, October 4, 1906, March 27, 1907, December 30, 1907, February 25, 1922
Indianapolis Star: December 29, 1907, December 31, 1907
Indianapolis Sun: September 26, 1899, September 28, 1907, December 30, 1907
I.O.O.F. Lodge # 548, Broad Ripple, Indiana Historical Society, https://images.indianahistory.org/digital/collection/dc012/id/14731/rec/4
Monon Railroad Historical-Technical Society, photos from the collection Ken Weller, https://monon.org/bygone_site/bygone/indy.php
Journals of the Common Council of the City of Indianapolis, 1907
R. L. Polk & Co.'s Indianapolis City Directory for 1892, https://iuidigital.contentdm.oclc.org/digital/collection/ICD/id/48757/rec/15
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