741 6th. Ave.

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

JAMES E. CASTO For the Herald-Dispatch

Mar 18, 2025

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Over the decades, 741 6th Ave. has been the address
 of a variety of business ventures. All have had
 something in common. Each has been all
 about showing its customers
 a good time.

The fun started in 1930 when Herbert Pringle Brown Sr.
 opened a candy store that he named The Sweet Shop.
 A native of St. Louis, Brown came to Huntington
 in 1906 to take a job with Armour  Co. which
 operated a meatpacking facility and
 regional sales office here.

The Sweet Shop wasn’t open long before Brown
 gave it a new name — The Bon Ton.

There are no clues as to what prompted Brown to open his candy
 shop or what inspired him to make the name change. “The
 Bon Ton” is a French phrase which roughly translates
 as “good manners” or “good taste.” While The
 Bon Ton started as a candy store, it evolved
 into a popular short-order restaurant.

Between the war years 1943 and 1945, the busy restaurant distributed
 a newsletter titled “The Bon Ton Bullets in the Service,” which
 printed excerpts from letters that area service members had
 sent home. In 1973 Harold “Bud” Nichols and his wife
 Virginia purchased The Bon Ton and renamed
 it The Valhalla Club. They would go on
 to operate it for 35 years.

In 2006, Patrick Guthrie and his father, Patrick Guthrie Sr.,
 purchased the club, changed its name to The V Club and
 transformed it into an enormously popular hub for
 live music acts that came through Huntington.

In March 2020 the raging COVID-19 pandemic forced the V Club
 to shut down. For a while, the club’s building on the southwest
 corner of 6th Avenue and 8th Street sat vacant. But in the
 summer of 2021, the former V Club was remodeled
 and rebranded as “The Loud — Live
 Music & Beer Garden.”

-----------------------------------------------------------

Note:  This Article and picture appeared in the Herald-Dispatch Newspaper on March 20, 2025.

-----------------------------------------------------------

[ Back ]