← Blog Apr 13, 2021 · Ian Greenleigh · Originally published on Medium
Four photos of Michael Joseph Gordon.
Update — 6/27/2024:
When I posted this in 2021, I was optimistic. Junior was the kind of guy people don’t forget, especially in 1985 Austin. The city was half the population and people like him shone brighter.
He was a central figure in the earliest days of Austin’s now-famous craft beer scene. Locals went to Junior’s the store for its imports and kegs, but also to see Junior the man. And they would just, like, hang out and drink beer and shoot the shit.
At the end of the article I asked people to get in touch if they knew him. I figured I’d hear from a handful of Austin old-timers.
That didn’t happen. But this week, a man named Thomas came through.
Subject: Junior’s Beer I remember his brother and him, I was an original customer and purchased longnecks by the case. I was reflecting on my years in Austin (1981–1989) and thinking about the people I knew and some of the things we did. Your article came up as a search result for Junior’s murder. I lived up the West hill at MoPac and rode my bicycle everywhere and enjoyed the selection of beers at Junior’s, that is where I tried Duvel for the first time. I remember Mike’s disappearance and have always wondered about it. His brother was about the same height as I recall, maybe older and I remember the red hair. Mike was two years older than me. I have been to way too many funerals in the last few years. Thanks for the article. Blue Skies, — Thomas
Thank you, Thomas. Blue skies to you too, brother.
Think of a place from your past. One you haven’t thought about in years. Summon your senses. What do you remember?
Usually when I remember things from college it seems like I’m replaying scenes from someone else’s life. I guess that’s just getting older. It must have been a decade since Junior’s Beer and Wine crossed my mind. But I guess the weird little red shack imprinted on some remote part of my brain because, let me tell you, one day in 2018 a friend sent me an article and I was right back there again. It’s vivid and familiar. I was young and naive and far too confident. I was a little less sad. Unlike most of my memories from that period, it’s a me I recognize.
I grin and roll my eyes at the faded beer babe posters. Feel the weight of the keg as we heave it into a pickup bed. Hear the thud when it lands. Wince at the rawness in my hands. Slip into a daydream about my crush, then silently curse her boyfriend’s name. Tonight we’ll flirt and dance and, years from now, we’ll get married and make two beautiful babies. But I don’t know that yet. The keg clangs on every concrete step up to the apartment; it’s a group effort. Finally we drop it into the grey plastic trashcan and cover it with ice and I plunge my aching hands right in. Some knucklehead sprays the foamy first sputters of Ziegen Bock directly into my mouth like a kid drinking from a hose (“Brewed and Available Only in Texas” — as if state pride helps you choke it down). I’m free as I’ll ever be.
…you can drive up to their dilapitated (sic) shack in west campus and get carside service from a true “slacker”. It’s like a living diarama (sic) in Austin’s natural history museum. All points for style.
— a 2007 Yelp review
Junior’s Beer & Wine in 2021. Photo by Ian Greenleigh.
Junior’s Beer & Wine in 2021. Photo by Ian Greenleigh.
Jack Ken wrote “West Campus beer store Junior’s has mysterious history” in 2013 for UT Austin’s college paper, The Daily Texan. The piece asks — but doesn’t answer — two questions about the original owner’s past: Who was “the man simply known as Junior?” And what happened to him?
Back in college, I never wondered for a second who Junior was, but now it was all I could think about. Nothing more has been written on the subject since the article ran in 2013. Hadn’t someone read it and contacted The Daily Texan or the store with a name? How could a string of people own a store called Junior’s, there in West Campus for decades, but not know who Junior really was?