The Gobbler (updated- I HAVE BEEN TO THE GOBBLER!!!!(pics) )
 

One of my biggest regrets is that I never saw this place while it was standing. I love it. I love it so very much. :love

The Gobbler

The boyfriend used to work with someone who was a dishwasher back in the day, but alas the place has been razed.

http://gobblermotel.blogspot.com/

Gobble gobble gobble gobble gobble gobble gobble gobble gobbbbbb-lurrrrrrrrr.......gobble gobble gobble!



UPDATE- I was under the impression that the entire thing had been torn down, but it turns out it was just the hotel. The restaurant, in all its Gobbler-y goodness, is closed but still standing. When I learned this, I decided I had to see it. And I sang the gobbler jingle the whole way there.

Apparently, the site is now a regular stop on the police route because of people scavenging for souvenirs. We did have some police circling, but they didn't hassle us. They must have figured I was just one more wingnut skipping around the place for a photo op.

Anyway.

The glimmer of the Gob on the horizon:


By the way, it's for sale...if you have about $3 million.
Don't miss the website...the woman's voice on the virtual tour is oh so sultry.


Here's the grand entryway, which is a bizarre amalgam of petrified wood, cement, and amethyst geodes. Yes, amethyst geodes. Purple is a theme, you see.







The Gob's looking a bit sad these days.


The roof-gravel is making a sly break for it, trying to blend in with the cooler gravel on the ground...


The former dumpster area held a bumper, an empty Polaroid cartridge and a broken-down trolley.


I was able to see far enough into the "employee entrance" to note that the butt-ugly lavender and baby blue railing was still in place...


And if you turn a bit to the left you can just barely peek into the dining room (I tried to see the revolving bar but couldn't)...


This was my absolute favorite part. The lavender furniture! It was STILL THERE!!!!!


If puce-colored pleather and black lava rock floating in concrete don't give you a hankerin' for some turkey, I don't know what will. How has this not been sold already?!?

I have $5 on me. Anyone?

Places like that should always be protected as historical landmarks. :/

When I was a land surveyor I noticed that archetecture evolved along with the rise in the popularity of cocaine. It turns out that I was right, I had heared other people talking about the "coke era homes" of the 70's and early 80's when engineers found that they could not only afford to do coke, but it made them more productive. They were also the first buildings to have siding applied diagonally.

How can you not love the "passion pit":


and the "bridal suite"? :orgasm



http://www.lileks.com/institute/motel/roost/4.html

"If you’re ever wondering what the War Room of “Dr. Strangelove” would look like if the movie had been directed by Prince, here you go. " :lol

I'm not going to lie. I would totally stay there for at least 2 nights. Reminds me of the motel they stayed in "A Goofy Movie" on their way to the power line concert.

The unlikely artificial-grape purple of the dining room is just so damn fabulous that I can hardly stand it.

http://www.lileks.com/institute/motel/roost/5.html

And turkeys on the carpet. A rotating bar. Petrified wood walls.

I would do all my Cougar hunting there. If I was 20 again :(

Agreed. Cities and regions are becoming so homogeneous these days; little pieces of Americana and (to a lesser degree) kitsch are being torn down to make room for another Wal-Mart or what have you.

I barely...barely...remember hotels in certain tourist traps that were vaguely like The Gobbler, although nowhere near as incredibly Gobbler-y.

There was one in Niagara Falls that had windows in the walls of the swimming pool. You walked past the hotel at street level and you could look in and see the swimmers' legs and butts. Sometimes that was a good thing but usually not.

The bf used to live near Wisconsin Dells and we went through a couple of years of trying out all the kitschy theme stuff when we were in town. The little cinderblock motels with the giant pink fiberglass elephants in the pool might have been just the thing in the 50s, 60s and 70s, but they're quite shitty and run down these days. We stayed in one that had a 1-inch gap under the room door and we could hear everything going on in the next room. Also, it was filthy.

The worst was a medieval castle-themed "resort". It was around $100 a night, and they gave you a free roll of quarters and shuttle to the local reservation casino. You'd go up the drive to this big floodlit castle only to see that it was a crumbling, stuccoed facade that only housed the front office. It concealed the fact that the real "hotel" was a run-down little building in the back.

We had to step over rolls of dirty torn-up carpeting and piles of laundry to get to our room. It was a "jacuzzi suite", according to the front desk, but all that meant was that there was a large bathtub in the middle of the room that shot someone's black hair out the jets when it was turned on. Felt like being in The Grudge. We skipped the jacuzzi.

There was some of the shag carpeting plastic-fantastic aura, but there were big holes in the sheets and the whole room was lit with eerie green fluorescent light that only enhanced the whole horror movie vibe. When the AC was on, the curtain blew inwards and everyone in the parking lot could see into the room.

The icing on the cake was when we were in the room with the door locked (supposedly) and some random woman on her cellphone walked right in before realizing she was in the wrong place.

It would have been great if they'd maintained the kitsch and...oh, I don't know...cleaned, but as it was the place was filthy, uncomfortable and gross. Eventually it was sold to a national chain, who turned it into a generic hotel, and I hear it's much better now.

:lol

Me and my ex ex girlfriend got a Heart Shaped Jacuzzi one year when we went to Niagara Falls. It was not grimey but it wasn't the cleanest. After a bunch of red tick beer I remember caring less.

They really make this stuff?

Pretty sure that's what it was called but I've only ever seen it in Canada.

Oh, well they would drink beer that dogs have swam in.

Will be driving past it next week, on my way to Milwaukee. Going to see the Titanic exhibit. You know my heart will go on.

Hopefully I can stop and look around, see what's there.

It's mainly a blank field. If you're standing in an empty field on a concrete slab and you can see the Johnson Creek water tower, you're there.

Just a warning, the police patrol the place regularly due to shag-looters.

Edit: if you're that close, you could go past where my boyfriend used to work skinning dead cats!

Myrtle Beach, South Carolina used to have a lot of old mom and pop hotels, nothing really kitschy like the Gobbler, though. Ever since they closed down the Pavillion amusement park they've been tearing down all of the old hotels, which have become seedy deathtraps where people usually get their throats cut.

well, at least it wasn't live cats.

so is the restaurant gone as well? i saw the article in the Madison paper about a turkey dinner there last year, even though the place was closed.

SO JUST HOW MANY WAYS ARE THERE?

:lol

better go ask mr. owl

Yeah, he heard that one a lot.

He also had to give enemas to dead frozen cats. He saw a lot of bad shit.

Edit: if the restaurant is there, I didn't see it. Yes, they do seem to imply that something is there. Maybe it's under different management?

The only remarkably tacky thing I know of in the area is some giant dinner theatre across from the cat-skinning place.

Wait, why did he skin then and flush thier bowels? Did these cats do something wrong?

He worked for a "biological supply company". He prepared specimens for dissection. The company bought frozen euthanized cats from the various Animal Control organizations for $2/ea, prepped them, and sold them to schools for much more.

I didn't like it, but I took comfort in the fact that at least he wasn't the one euthanizing the animals, and he was somewhat respectful (didn't hold them up and improvise Meow Mix tableaux with them as some of his coworkers did).

His job was to skin the cats because, naturally, it's easier to distance yourself when it doesn't look like Mittens or Fluffy back home. Then, because even biology students don't want to have to deal with the wormy feces of strays, he would have to stick a hose up their asses and flush them clean.

When one of my cats walks across the DVR and knocks the cable loose, his threats have a little extra bite.

He also prepared skinned mink (fur goes to coats, body goes to dissection labs), rats, pigeons, various livestock parts, mudpuppies, frogs and earthworms. He had to inject the vascular systems with blue and red latex, but never built up the skill because he's colorblind.

He had to sign a paper when he was hired that said he would never submit anything to "Dirty Jobs".

I LOVE 60's architecture. I hear there is a hotel in disneyworld that is comepletely unchanged since its erection, and if I ever have a family to take on vacation, it will be there.

oh god lol