Bar Closed In N. Wildwood For (Gasp!) Serving A 20-Year-Old

The Daily News reports today that Keenan’s, beloved North Wildwood Irish pub, will be closed for Irish Weekend. Keenan’s? Closed for Irish Weekend? Be still my Irish heart!

The annual festival, which begins today, brings thousands to the five-mile island to do many things celebrating Irish heritage, like drinking, getting drunk and listening to Timmy Kelly (pictured) while consuming alcohol. (There are events that are about Irish heritage and non-alcoholic fun — and there’s probably a Mass, too — but I’ve never known anyone who attended them. Maybe I only know drunks.)

Keenan’s big sin was (get ready for this) serving alcohol to both a 20-year-old and an 18-year-old. Since every bar everywhere ever in the history of mankind has served underage patrons, the usual maxim with selectively-enforced laws applies: Somebody at Keenan’s pissed the wrong person off.

Keenan says the bar is constantly fighting a battle against fake IDs. He believes that his family is being punished for flaws in New Jersey’s and Pennsylvania’s licensing systems. “That hand we’ve been dealt isn’t 100 percent accurate. Yeah, we served minors. But we confiscated 175 fake IDs from Memorial Day to Labor Day,” said Keenan, 35.

“The bottom line is we have four separate violations, with a total of six underage drinkers in 10 years. Every one of them had a Pennsylvania valid ID with no dupes.”

Hey, only six underage drinkers (in a bar that takes up a whole block) in 10 years! That’s quite a record. Now that the bar is closed for Irish Weekend, no one under the age of 21 will ever drink in New Jersey again. You can lay off now, Richard Codey!

N. Wildwood’s Keenan’s shut for Irish Weekend [Daily News]
Photo by Irish Philadelphia, Creative Commons License