New Restaurant & Brewery With Familiar Name Set Open In Brewer, Maine This Fall

Chances are, if you grew up in the Bangor area, you've passed by or maybe even popped in to a little bar called Benjamin's on Franklin Street.

Benjamin's has been around since the early 70s. It started as a two-story spot, then in the late 80s Panda Garden leased the upstairs part of the building, and Benjamin's became known as a basement bar. Eventually, the restaurant closed up shop.

Local Benjamin's regular and eventual manager, Richard "Clarko" Clark, had his first beer at Benjamin's.

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After the building was sold, and the bar had been shut down for a period of time, Clark, who has worked in the food and beverage industry since the 80s, approached the owners with the proposition to reclaim the space that the restaurant had taken over.

His plan: to restore Benjamin's to the way it used to be, in it's hayday.

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He took on the project himself, buying the pub in January of 2019, renovating it, and opening the new space in June of 2019. Clark and his wife, Mandy, ran the business until they sold it to some hand-picked entrepenaurs in december of 2024.

They then set their sights to expanding the Benjamin's brand across the bridge, in Brewer.

In the process of renovating Benjamin's on Franklin Street in Bangor, in 2020, Clark also purchased the old Sid Harvey warehouse on the Acme Road in Brewer.

Working little by little, Clark and his family managed to gut that building, and draw up plans for Benjamin's Brewer,  a restaurant and brewery in that new location.

"This is going to be more of a brewery/restaurant. It's going to be open from right around lunch time, till about 8 or 9. We haven't really cemented it yet."

"It'll be pizzas and sandwiches, kind of comfort food, but we've got our own twist on it. We're going to utilize the grains that we use from brewing beer in our breads and our pizza shells. It's something we don't really have around here."

"We have 5 barrel tanks and then I have a smaller one barrel tank. They'll be cooking constantly. I've got 20 taps in here. Probably 3 or 4 of them will be other beverages besides ours, but the rest of them will be ours. So we'll have quite a variety."

"We intend to supply the restaurant/brewery and we intend to supply some of the local restaurants as well, so you'll see it around town as well. "

"Once we acquired the property, we couldn't really do anything with it until the following July. It was about 7 months before we could get the permits and plans."

"The interior is pretty well done. The walls are blank canvases. This is why it doesn't look like we've done much yet on the outside. We got the groundwork done in the first year."

They've been concentrating their effort on the inside, but say the parking lot and the patio fence will come in a few weeks. They'll get the get the plumbing and electrical done and work on buttoning things up.

Their goal, Clark says, is to open on November 11th, Veteran's Day. As his wife explains, that date was picked on purpose because Richard Clarko Clark is a veteran himself.

"We have a military/first responders theme."

"We'll have two mug clubs. One is for military and first responders that will get a discount on their beverages.

"The other will be for everyone else. We'll be decorating with pictures of veterans and first responders, local hometown heroes. Our veterans and first responders, we just can't thank them enough."

They also have a spacious back patio area they hope to have finished by next year.

The Clarks, who are residents of Brewer themselves, say this project has been a labor of love and a family affair, with their son's helping them build out the location.

Their also excited to be opening a business in their own hometown.

"The community is excited and the City has been great to work with."

The Clarks are planning to host several community events at their new space. One in the works already for next year is a big Octoberfest celebration.

Welcome to the neighborhood, Benjamin's Brewer. We look forward to your opening in a couple of months!