On the corner of County Road H2 and Edgewood Drive, just off Old Highway 10, Robert’s was a nightclub and menace to the local community. What happened at Robert’s didn’t stay at Robert’s; I remember the street races that started at the club and peeled down Edgewood and its steep hill at the end of the street—I watched them from my bedroom window. On summer nights, standing around with my dad in the driveway, we could hear the crowd at Robert’s shouting at indie wrestlers or the musical acts lined up shrieking. Occasionally, police sirens and ambulance lights originating from Robert’s filtered down the street.
In 2012, it closed. Nights became a lot quieter on Edgewood Drive, at the cost of an unsettling lifelessness at the end of the road. The community responded tentatively. The parking lot in front became the playground of one scavenger in particular, a man who sold flags and tapestries and other junk and turned the pavement into his storefront. The building became the second favorite spot for graffiti artists to tag (behind parts of Rice Creek trail heading south from Edgewood towards Irondale High School and Long Lake). I even took a date there to gawk at the building that was Robert’s.
In September 2013, the city demolished the building, stopping even fledgling activities from starting up again and preventing anyone from continuing its legacy, and the legacies of Muldoon’s and the Anchor Inn that came before Robert’s. In the 2020s, an apartment mega-complex was built on the site, shrouding Edgewood Drive in shadows.
