Adirondack Legend, The Dew Drop Inn, Re-Opens in 2025
The Dew Drop Inn, located at 27 Broadway, in Saranac Lake, NY, was purchased in May 1947 by Forrest “Dew Drop” Morgan, thus converting the Rathskeller to the Dew Drop Inn.
Katie Stiles, owner of Adirondack Stiles Real Estate Company represents the current owner, Taimim Li, third generation of a family in the tungsten industry. He bought the property in June 2022.
The building is in rough shape, after sitting vacant and having been flooded over the years.
“It’s a full-blown restoration,” Stiles said. “From the foundation up.”
“Li grew up with family in the Saranac Lake area,” according to Stiles, “and he fondly recalls his summers visiting here and eating at the Dew Drop with them. He wanted to invest in Saranac Lake and recreate his experience for others. It’s his project, but it’s something we’re all going to be thankful for.”
What Li is planning is a ground-level bar with games like an antique billiards table, a downstairs restaurant next to the river and six rooms for rent upstairs.
While the doors to the Dew Drop Inn have been shuttered for a few decades, a grand re-opening is scheduled for 2025. The exact date will be announced soon.
Paul Smith’s is experiencing a major revitalization as well—and we hope the community will participate in the revitalization of the Dew Drop Inn, Saranac Lake, the Adirondacks, and Paul Smith’s College.
In fact, many alums have worked at the Dew Drop Inn—or certainly have frequented it. Boxer Muhammad Ali and swimmer Buster Crabbe were customers, and Faye Dunaway (Bonnie & Clyde’s Bonnie Parker) even worked there in the early 60s.
“On any given day through the heart of the 20th century, blue-collar workers in Saranac Lake could be found pounding burgers at the Dew Drop Inn on Broadway, right alongside bejeweled ladies from Upper Saranac nibbling on seafood platters, boisterous, five-o’clock-somewhere barflies, politicians feasting on New York Strips and college kids tossing pizza crusts to the ducks drifting by on the river that flowed a few feet beneath the cantilevered dining room.”
—Tim Rowland, Adirondack Life, March/April 2024