The bar, or lounge as Joe liked to call it, will go on.
Her son, Joe Brehm, who took over in 1981 and continued her commitment to friendly service and an inclusive atmosphere, died April 3. She opened This Is It! in downtown Milwaukee in 1968 and soon after welcomed a customer base made up mostly of gay men whose nearby tavern had closed. The bigger wonder might be that the bar was started by his mother. You may be surprised that Wisconsin's oldest continuously operating gay bar was run by a guy with a wife and two kids who assembled for family dinner at home every night.
