The Silver Dollar Bar inside the Wort Hotel gets its name from the 2,032 uncirculated 1921 silver dollars pressed into the bar top — every one of them genuine, every one of them still there after more than seven decades of elbows and drink orders.
The Wort Hotel sits on the corner of Glenwood Street and Broadway, half a block off Town Square, which puts it squarely in the middle of Jackson’s foot traffic without feeling like a tourist trap. The Silver Dollar Bar occupies the ground floor and pulls in a genuinely mixed crowd: ranch hands, visiting anglers, conference attendees, longtime locals who’ve been coming since before the ski industry made Jackson expensive. The room has the low ceilings and dark wood paneling of a place that wasn’t designed for Instagram, and that’s part of what makes it work.
The bar program is traditional Wyoming — whiskey-forward, unpretentious, with a decent rotating tap selection. Order the Silver Dollar Old Fashioned if the season’s right; they make it without fanfare and it doesn’t need any. The Snake River Lager shows up on tap more often than not, which is a reasonable default if you’re not sure what to get. Cocktail prices run $14–$18, which is on par with Jackson generally and doesn’t feel gouged.
Live music happens most nights during summer and around ski season. The acts tend toward country, Western swing, and folk — actual musicians rather than background noise. The small stage leaves almost no distance between the performer and the nearest barstool, so if the act is good, the room feels it immediately. Check the Wort’s website or call ahead; the schedule fills in a week or two out and they post it reliably.
For food, the Silver Dollar Bar keeps things straightforward: burgers, fries, a few sandwiches, some appetizers that hold up over a couple of rounds. The buffalo burger is worth ordering — not elaborate, just solid. The kitchen closes earlier than the bar, so if food is part of the plan, arriving before 9 p.m. is wise. Dinner for two with drinks runs somewhere in the $60–$90 range depending on what you’re drinking.
The hotel itself, built in 1941 and rebuilt after a fire in 1980, is independently owned and has held onto a character that chain properties in the valley tend to lack. Even if you’re not staying there, the lobby is worth walking through — there’s a certain lived-in grandeur that fits the town’s self-image more honestly than most of the newer builds around it.
Parking on Glenwood or in the Town Square garage is straightforward outside of July and August, when Jackson’s street parking requires patience. The bar is open daily; hours shift seasonally, but it’s reliably open by late afternoon and runs past midnight on weekends. No cover charge for the music. No dress code beyond basic decency. The silver dollars in the bar top are, in fact, the right reason to look down at least once.
