Did you know Red River's Main Street grocery carries a German name for a very Red River reason? Der Markt Food Store, at 307 West Main Street, opened its doors in June 1970, when the town was briefly trying on an alpine look. The ski area was in its tenth year, Toni and Ilse Woerndle had just turned the old S.E.B. Motel into the Alpine Lodge, and new condos carried names like Eisenhut and Edelweiss. In that moment, naming the new market Der Markt, German for the market, seemed like a good idea.
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The store's story starts a decade earlier. Glen Calhoun moved his family to Red River from Fort Worth, Texas, in 1960, bringing his Texas grocery experience with him. He built a small store called Glen's Superette on High Street, on the spot where Erik's Workshop stands today. In 1964 his son Ted bought Johnny's Store from Johnny and Rosemary Brandenburg, who had run it summers only. Ted, his first wife Beth, and their three sons, Michael, Brian and Matt, lived behind that store, renamed Red River Grocery, and kept it open year-round until the winter of 1969.
Then father and son made a Main Street move together. Glen and Ted closed their separate stores, bought the land where Der Markt stands today, and started construction in the early spring of 1970. The new store opened that June, carpeted, as the family proudly remembers, and it grew with the town. A major expansion in 1979 added a third again to its original size, about 33 percent, and fifty years after it opened, the family notes, the store had come back around to carpet again.
Red River never did stay alpine. As the Der Markt family tells it, the town did not continue toward the alpine look, but naturally became the western, cowboy-themed town visitors know today. The Calhouns thought about the name, resisted the temptation to rename the store through the years, and grew fond of the mispronunciations. Many locals and visitors call it the Deer Market, or simply the Der, and that affectionate nickname has become part of its identity.
The market is still a family story on Main Street. Ted married Linda Lyles in 1993, and their five children, all born and raised in Red River, are part of the town's business community, with ties the family lists to Roadrunner RV Resort, Red River Brewery and Distillery, and Go Kart City. Linda continues to operate Calhoun Real Estate, the business Glen founded in 1962, and Main Street Mercantile, both located next door to Der Markt. Walk in for groceries today, and you are stepping into a Main Street building that has fed miners' grandchildren, ski families, and summer visitors for more than half a century.