EDIT.... Here's to Wolf Lodge 2.0

It would be easier, perhaps even smarter, for the owners of the Wolf Lodge Steakhouse to take the insurance money and walk away from the restaurant destroyed in the Labor Day fire. No one would blame them for selling the property where it sat about 8 miles east of Coeur d’Alene just off U.S. 95, heading out on an extended vacation and enjoying a well-deserved, relaxed lifestyle. 

Maybe that’s what will happen.  

We hope not. 

The Wolf Lodge had been around nearly half a century. When it went up in flames Sept. 2, it was the loss of a beloved institution in North Idaho. It was not an ordinary restaurant. People came from near and far to dine there. And while the food was great, that wasn’t so much of what attracted them. You could get a steak and beer pretty much anywhere. What brought them there was the character, the ambiance, the atmosphere. And most definitely, the people. So many memories lived inside that timbered building.

If you ever had a chance to talk with Wolf Lodge employees, you were likely struck by their sense of family. It was more than a job, more than a paycheck. It was a place where staff knew they were part of something special, so they stuck around. They took their work to heart, which explains why they labored so hard for so long and went the extra mile night after night. After the fire, their futures uncertain, many of them waited together, finding comfort in each other. 

While we can’t have the Wolf Lodge Steakhouse back that we all knew and loved, perhaps we could have something close to it. As the owner and management wrote in a Facebook post Oct. 24, “This note is NOT saying we are rebuilding but we are looking into building Wolf Lodge 2.0.” 

We hope it happens. 

We think Wolf Lodge 2.0 would be special in its own right. A place of great food and great people. A place that, like its predecessor, would be filled with smiles and laughs, where memories are made that last a lifetime. 

Some say even if they rebuild, the customers won’t return as there was only one Wolf Lodge Steakhouse in North Idaho. What was lost can't be found. But as James Earl Jones said in the excellent movie “Field of Dreams,” if you build it, “People will come.” 

Wolf Lodge 2. We’ll eat and drink to that.