Poteau
 
 
Shel and I hit the road this morning for a two-day road trip to eastern Oklahoma.  Our itinerary was ambitious:  The schedule allowed 3.5 hours travel time to Poteau, followed by about 11 hours of shooting Thursday, a few hours sleep overnight, then another 5 to 6 hours shooting before logging another 3.5 hours road-time to get us back home Friday evening.  Our first scheduled stop was a place in Poteau called the Coffee Cup, pitched to us as a "Cute place for lunch."  Shel called from the road to let them know we were on our way, and after disconnecting the call said, "I'm a bit leery of a business that answers the phone 'Hello?'"
 
Turns out her fears were unfounded.  We pulled into the parking lot of the Coffee Cup saying to each other something along the lines of, "This isn't at all what I expected!"  In fact, the Coffee Cup turned out to be a stylish, modern coffee house... not at all the backwater, hole-in-the-wall café we were envisioning.  What we found was a brand new, log-cabin-esque building with highly polished wood floors, refrigerated display cases housing some of the best looking desserts either of us has ever seen, and a coffee menu that could hold its own against shops in such areas as San Francisco, New York... even Seattle.
 
Tammy Johnson is the proprietor of the Coffee Cup.  She told us that she and her husband, a builder, had been kicking around the idea of opening a coffee house for several years.  You see, they like a good after-dinner cuppa joe every now and then, and, living in Poteau, their best option had always been to travel about half an hour to Ft. Smith, Arkansas.  Tired of driving 30 miles  and crossing state lines for a good cup of coffee, Tammy and her husband decided to make a go of it about six months ago.  They built the building, opening as a drive-thru-only business at first while finishing the interior, then subsequently opening as a full service coffee house/restaurant offering such amenities as certified free-trade, organic coffees and free wi-fi access.
 
It's a niche that has proven to be popular, especially among the local Carl Albert State College students, who come for the hip atmosphere and free internet connection, but it's also been a great draw for the lunch crowd, which consists of locals as well as passers-through such as oil and gas men from the big cities in search of something besides the trucked-in, fried-from-frozen, small-town standards.
 
Make no mistake, though, the true stand-out here is the coffee.  Tammy and her team have studied the art of constructing a fine coffeehouse coffee, and can deliver a concoction that rivals the finest that baristas from coast to coast have to offer.  They're even working to perfect their own brand of coffee art, something that our neighbors in New Orleans might call lagniappe, which, roughly translated, means, "a little something extra!"
 
Thursday, June 14, 2007
Coffee art
A couple of doors down from the Coffee Cup is Myers Drive-In, which has been an institution in Poteau since Curtis and Ophaline Myers opened its doors 30 years ago. The elder Myers’, in their eighties and married sixty-three years, have since handed over the keys to their son, who in turn has passed them on to his daughter, making this colorful spot near downtown a third generation enterprise in Poteau. If you happen to pull into a stall on one of the frequent evenings that Curtis and Ophaline are there enjoying an ice cream cone, be prepared to sit a spell. If you’re a local, chances are they know you by name... even watched you grow up. Makes sense, then, that they’ll be anxious to hear what’s new, and ready to swap a few stories. If, however, you’re a TV crew that shows up to do a feature on the drive-in, you’d better show up hungry! Preferably for something deep-fried. Tonight we were treated to any number of batter-fried treats: Pickle-O’s (fried pickles) are the drive-in’s best seller. Fried Beans (yes, deep-fried green beans) are a relatively new menu item. But my personal favorite was the Texas Toothpicks (batter-dipped-and-fried jalapeño and onion strips). After a 25-year career as a milkman, Curtis opened the restaurant because, though the hours were longer, the labor was much less physically intense, he says. The drive-in originally was a Sonic franchise, but years of corporate conformity and menu restrictions (Sonic did away with Pickle-O’s, to the dismay of his regulars) led Myers to put up his own neon marquee. The Myers family says they enjoy having the freedom to offer their customers menu items that they can’t find elsewhere, and their customers love them for it. So if you find yourself in Poteau with an appetite for something deep-fried, just look for the purple and green neon on Broadway.
Family tradition
View from Kerr Conference Center, Poteau, OK
Lifestyles of the Rich and Famous
After a belly full of deep-fried goodness and a head full of local flavor, Shel and I decided it was time to check in with our gracious hosts for the night: The Kerr Conference Center and Museum just outside Poteau.  The Kerr Center is an 11,000 plus square foot home situated on 40 hilly acres outside Poteau originally constructed in the late 1950’s, early 1960’s as the summer/retirement home for Oklahoma’s first native-born Governor and long-time Senator, Robert S. Kerr and his family.  The home was donated to the State Regents for Higher Education after the deaths of Mr. and Mrs. Kerr, and is now operated as a conference center, bed and breakfast and museum.
 Some of the twenty rooms that make up the bed and breakfast are named for notable guests, including former Presidents John F. Kennedy, Lyndon B. Johnson, Gerald Ford and George W. Bush.  From its perch atop a high hill, the home has great views of the Poteau river valley below, and the Kiamichi mountain range in the distance.  You can learn more by visiting their website.