Stepping up to save artifacts of iconic bar

Todd Borowsky looks around what’s left of one of Scottsdale’s most authentic watering holes as workmen begin dismantling the place. “This is a piece of Arizona history,” he says. “This is for real.” He has to speak up because a forklift is passing nearby, hauling away yet another piece of that history.

We are standing in Greasewood Flat, or what’s left of it.

Greasewood was one of those Arizona oddities that everybody loves, tourists and locals alike.

George “Doc” Cavalliere, the son of one of the city’s pioneering families, bought 43 acres in north Scottsdale in the 1950s. It was a place to escape the bustle of downtown Scottsdale and the family blacksmith shop. In 1975, he opened a bar and grill on a piece of it, a handy desert hideaway for his family and friends — in those days, most of Scottsdale.

There was greasewood all around and the land was flat. Thus, Greasewood Flat was born. It wasn’t much. A barroom inside an old bunkhouse, once used by ranch hands at DC Ranch back when the place was populated with cows instead of millionaires. A tap shack and some picnic tables, with live music and dancing beneath a wide open starspangled Arizona sky. In other words, magic. But magic rarely lasts and far too soon reality intruded.

There is no place left in Scottsdale anymore for the old places that gave the West’s Most Western Town its charm.

Places like Rawhide and Reata Pass. Like Greasewood Flat. Cavalliere died in 2009 and in 2013, his family sold the land to pay estate taxes and other bills. Greasewood Flat closed on March 31and last weekend, pieces of the place were sold to the highest bidder.

Soon it will be just another marvel of master planning.

Todd Borowsky could not bear to see it wiped out.

He grew up in the area. As a kid he rode his dirt bike through this desert. As an adult, he rode his Harley, often stopping at Greasewood Flat for a cheeseburger and a cold one.

“This is a part of history, just like Rawhide was,” said Borowsky, who owns a Scottsdale strip club. “I think this was one of our last icons of our Western roots.”

Sadly, Scottsdale didn’t step in to

try to preserve it. The city that spent $13.6 million to build a Western museum apparently has no interest in history right under its nose.

So Borowsky decided to do it himself, at last weekend’s auction.

“I was just going to get the entrance sign, but the more I looked at everything, the more I realized that we were going to lose the heart and soul of it,” he told me. “So I put together a plan of what I thought was the core of the heart and soul, major items that could be preserved.”

By the final bang of the gavel last Saturday, Borowsky had bought the tap room, the Greasewood/Reata parade float, eight wagons and a number of the oddities that Cavalliere collected through the years to add to the ambiance of the joint.

Like the famous entrance sign and the horse parking arch. Like the rusty ’36 Ford pickup and the Greasewood Volunteer Fire Department Water Wagon. Like the water tank and the storage barn, the silo and the barbecue and, of course, six of the fire pits that ringed the dance floor.

Like the metalwork, fashioned by Cavalliere at the blacksmith shop that is a Scottsdale institution. And the giant redwood tree stumps, the ones that Borowsky says once graced the old Legend City amusement park. Another piece of history, long gone now. In all, Borowsky bought $100,000 worth of Greasewood, history he says he’ll set up in his yard and use for barbecues until he can find a more public place where everybody can enjoy it.

“Right now I’m just going to preserve it on my property until I find the right home for it, just keep it together,” he said. “I know we’ve lost our title of the West’s Most Western Town, but I still believe in that slogan.”