Minuteman Grad Dan Wetherbee's Hearty Life as a Family Man, Bar Co-Owner and Proud Army Vet

PHOTOS COURTESY DAN WETHERBEE

By Judy Bass

Dan Wetherbee sure knows how to multi-task. On a recent evening while he was working at Danny Sullivan’s, the bar he co-owns in Framingham, he adroitly handled an interview on the phone for a newspaper article, fielded occasional questions from his employees and cooked an 18-inch pizza for a customer. He even managed to flip it a few times without missing a beat.

Mr. Wetherbee, 45, opened the combination bar, eatery and local band venue on January 1, 2017 with his partner, George Sullivan. Business at the 115-seat establishment is brisk already, probably in some measure due to his evident gusto for the new enterprise.

“I really enjoy this bar,” he declares. “It’s the best thing I’ve ever done, next to having a family and being in the Army.”

Mr. Wetherbee, a native of Concord who now lives in Worcester, got his culinary training at Minuteman High School in Lexington (he appreciatively mentioned two of his former culinary teachers, Mr. Joe Pitta and the late Norman Myerow). He graduated from Minuteman in 1991. Today, he says, “I make good food, simple food” at Danny Sullivan’s, unapologetically describing the fare he serves as “sloppy stuff that will never have the word healthy attached to it.”

The menu features items that certainly aren’t dainty or restrained, such as gourmet grilled cheese sandwiches piled high with three-quarters of a pound of roast beef slathered with barbeque sauce and pepperjack cheese. “I go heavy on everything,” Mr. Wetherbee explains gleefully. “People like to eat really-bad-for-you food once in a while. When they leave my place, they say, ‘That was awesome!’”

Mr. Wetherbee clearly has found a niche in life that suits him, one that he could not have foreseen years ago. He comes from a family steeped in public service – his grandfather was an inspector in the Concord Police Department for nearly 30 years, his father was on the force and his uncle was Concord’s chief of police. Asked why he did not follow in their footsteps, Mr. Wetherbee simply said, “I’m just not a police officer.”

Instead, he opted for a career in the military, signing up for the Army when he was still a junior at Minuteman. He was a scout for 10 years, then a medic serving in Germany and Iraq, including an 18 month stint in war-ravaged Mosul. After he left the Army, Mr. Wetherbee was an armed security officer at both the state and federal levels for a few years, then he “just played golf a lot,” he joshes.

Thanks to what he has been through and seen, Mr. Wetherbee understands the plight of veterans who come back to the States with physical injuries, post-traumatic stress, or find themselves homeless and in urgent need of resources to help them cobble their lives back together again. That’s why he reaches out to them by doing things like holding a fundraiser to benefit the Wounded Warrior Project. He’s now thinking about working with the Worcester Homeless Veterans organization.

Mr. Wetherbee shoehorns these and other activities into a relentlessly hectic daily schedule. He said that five or six days a week, he doesn’t leave Danny Sullivan’s until the wee hours, maybe 2:30 a.m. He’s up at 6:30 a.m. and is at the bar by around 9:30 a.m. to clean the kitchen, pay the bills, and vacuum, then he leaves at 1:30 p.m. to pick up his nine-year-old son from school. Then he’s back at Danny Sullivan’s again by late afternoon to prepare for the night shift. His wife of ten years, whom he met in the Army, is also extremely busy; she holds down two jobs.

All in all, Mr. Wetherbee is very content with the life he has fashioned for himself. He finds gratification in being around others and pleasing them, whether it’s by giving them hearty stick-to-your-ribs chow or spending precious downtime with his family.

“I’m doing well,” he concludes. “My life is running the bar and cooking food. I’m quite happy being me.”