The Waltham Tavern: A final farewell to an old neighbor

It has been three months since I headed down from Boston to Brooklyn, but I couldn't help but glance at this story in today's Boston Globe -- the end of the end of the road for the building that formerly housed the Waltham Tavern. Or, as I knew it, my next-door neighbor. The dive bar still operated at full tilt when I moved into the South End in 2005, and I'd heard the warnings about the joint. Can't say they ever caused problems during my tenure, although the cops said otherwise. The bar shut down. The liquor license got sold. And what do you know, the new owner will turn the site into even more million-dollar condos. Just what the South End needs.