Fans of the old TV show Cheers will remember how, whenever the character Norm Peterson walked in, everyone shouted “NORM!” in unison. That happens pretty frequently when Frank Burnette walks into The Lift, the artist’s bar on Fourth Street in downtown Des Moines (though they use Frank’s name, not Norm’s of course).

Frank’s no stranger to the arts (or to the neighborhood). He’s been a long-time fan of live music (since the Sixties) and is one of the owners/founders of The Vaudeville Mews, Des Moines’ foremost venue for new and independent music, just down the street from The Lift. You’ll sometimes see him there, or hanging out with Tommy Farrell at Tommy's Chicago Italian Beef Sandwich shop, or anywhere else about the Fourth and Court neighborhood. He’s a denizen, as we say.

He’s also produced theatre at the Mews, and has worked with The 4th Street Theatre, the Subjective Theatre Company, and has seen more stagings of Broadway Musicals than any other sane human I know; he'll travel to Broadway for the openings, and then follow the touring companies from city to city (not literally ‘follow’ of course, but we’ve often caught him taking a day or two off here and there to catch his 38th performance of Les Miserables or whatever). He’s also a fan of film, and an aspiring screenwriter; his current script (8 years in the making) is now hundreds of pages in.

Frank is an interesting guy. He’s been a practicing attorney for 44 years (in criminal law), was in the U.S. Navy for 28 years in the JAG Corps and has been a General Court Martial Military Judge the last 5 years. He ran marathons competitively from 1977 thru 1991 and was a USSF Soccer Referee (Youth thru NCAA Semi-Pro).

He’s an avid collector – art and books of course (especially some beautiful and rare volumes) but bumper-stickers too, and tee-shirts, and theatre and film posters and promos, playscripts and screenplays, Broadway playbills, and so on. Treasures he’s gathered over a lifetime of the above mentioned business and busy-ness; and he keeps it all in the shop where he lives, around the corner from Fourth Street on Court Avenue.

You can stop in the shop whenever he’s there, swap stories with him, and make off with some really sweet rarity; or, nowadays, you can come online, and browse his wares here.