Page 25 - Flathead Beacon // 7.23.14

FUNKY TOWN THE PALM & THE DISCO DAZE OF WHITEFISH
FLATHEADBEACON.COM JULY 23, 2014 | 25
its haircut and altered its cosmetic makeup – the influence of The Palm lives on in downtown Whitefish. But the “disco sucks” movement led to an implosion of the scene in the ear- ly 1980s, and by 1983 The Palm was bleeding money, and Baalim, who once entertained plans of opening a chain of discotheques in Montana, was forced to close the disco.
“That really tore Fraser apart,” Pieroni said. “He really loved that place. We all did.”
“It was short lived because disco was short lived,” Blankenship said. “I remember some local telling me that the disco ruined this town. That broke my heart.”
“The Palm ignited this town. It created the Whitefish that you see today,” Roberts said. “We were way ahead of our time.”
“People just quit coming in,” Ca- bell recalled. “It seemed like the whole scene just died. The ‘disco sucks’ movement took over and put an end to it. It’s funny, too, because now the clubs are doing the same thing.”
“Old Fraser Baalim sold it and it never was the same,” Herman said. “I don’t know why or what happened. It just kind of fell apart. Maybe the rage
An original brochure advertises The Palm Discotheque. COURTESY OF PAT PIERONI
just faded and people got tired of it. It kind of simmered and simmered and slowed and slowed and eventually they turned off the lighted floor and it just went back to a regular bar. Ultimately they ripped the whole thing out.”
A few years ago, Roberts organized a reunion of The Palm and invited 39 of the 45 employees who worked there in various capacities; 36 of them showed up for a weekend of barhopping, and Roberts had The Palm’s original T- shirts reprinted.
“It was like a college experience. We all took care of each other. It was a really special time in Whitefish,” Rob- erts said.
Baalim never recovered from the death of The Palm, and his own death was memorialized at the reunion.
Blankenship, who came to White- fish in July 1976 to help build The Palm, never left, and today is still working in construction.
“The Palm brought me here. When I first came here it was all I wanted,” he said. “Every other place was Dis- ney World and Whitefish was the real world. Most of the people who were there in the 70s are still here. We just don’t have The Palm.”
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