Best Dive Bar and Runner-Up Best Late-Night Food 2024
Words by KIKI DY
Photography by PETER COLIN MURRAY
Styling by SARA SPICER
Produced by MORRIGAN MAZA, GOOD CULTURE CREATIVE
THE REGULARS OF ELLIE’S CROW BAR LOUNGE know each other’s rhythms and routines. When I announce my plan to spend 10 hours at the Wilmington Island watering hole on assignment, Jamie Pleta, co-owner of Finches Sandwiches and Sundries (Winner Best Sandwiches 2024) tells me exactly how the night is going to go, with private investigator-level precision.
“If you’re there on a Thursday, Collin will be in to bartend at 5. The other bartender, Trace, usually stays until 6 — he just got a super cute puppy named PorkChop who I love,” she texts in our overzealous iMessage thread before pausing to ask: “Is it creepy that I know their schedules?”
Though Pleta was corresponding with me from a vacation in Mexico, she lamented that she would rather be at Crow Bar. “I haven’t been in five days, and I miss it.”
When I arrive at 4 p.m., Trace (government name Charles Edward Cunningham III) is behind the rather beautiful bar made from ship hatches. When I tell him I’m writing an article, his response is, “You know Wilmington Island has mob connections, right?” Then, Collin arrives right on cue.
Trace and the tipplers let me in on the rituals one must follow to join the aspirational ranks of a Crow Bar regular. Don’t order a double, they advise. Do order a jello shot. Get the $25 porterhouse with mushrooms and onions, onion rings on the side. Hot yaki wings at midnight.
When I ask what keeps people coming back, the answers are straightforward but convincing. “The greatest place on earth,” “best fried chicken ever” and other adoring refrains repeat on a loop.
Places like Ellie’s don’t just happen overnight. They must have the hard-won authenticity that only comes from decades of doing business and changing very little along the way. It’s a place where a regular who can point to a chair and say, “That’s where my grandpa used to sit.”
However, perhaps the biggest distinguisher between a true dive and a Disney-fied one is that any self-respecting dive would never self-identify as a dive. Crow Bar owner Ellie Coursey, 81, lends credence to that statement. “We are not a dive. We are a neighborhood bar with good prices and great drinks,” she tells me over a Tito’s and tonic.
Although the matriarch can’t remember if she and her husband, Grant, (the bar’s former namesake) opened in 1970 or 1971, she does remember that they named themselves after Old Crow bourbon, and that Grant believed in a stiff pour. What’s changed since 1970? “Nothing,” she says proudly.
That’s what makes Crow Bar singular. It’s remember when personified — the great keeper of Wilmington Island memories and secrets covered in a neon-lit patina that can only be acquired by being the watering hole of choice for generations of passionate patrons. Or, as Ellie puts it, “This is a place where everyone feels comfortable. If you come into Crow Bar and don’t feel comfortable, there’s something wrong with you.”
Kiki Dy is a writer, tea drinker and yoga teacher who came to Savannah by serendipity. Her work appears in local and national outlets such as The Sunday Long Read, Eater, Healthline, Belt Magazine and Thrillist. She’s still recovering from the hangover she acquired while researching this article.
