Twenty years ago, before Houston's and Starbucks, before Tarpon Bend and Benihana, two Irish guys who grew up in a small town near Dublin decided to try their luck with an old-fashioned pub like the ones back home.

Two decades later, JohnMartin's Irish Pub & Restaurant is credited with changing downtown Coral Gables -- and making thousands honorary Irish men and women, with the best shepherd's pie in town, seven types of draft beers, 19 brands of bottle beers and at least 30 brands of single malts.

But when JohnMartin's opened in 1989, the owners couldn't serve beer at the long wooden bar they had imported from Ireland.

``What kind of pub doesn't serve beer at the bar?'' asked Martin Lynch, one of the partners of the pub that is celebrating its 20th anniversary next week.

Lynch took that question to Coral Gables City Commissioner Mark Wolff, who worked with the city attorney and his colleagues to change a 1926 ordinance that limited bar service to hotels and country clubs. At JohnMartin's they could only serve drinks at the tables. That 1990 change led to the rebirth of downtown Gables as a nightlife destination.

``I was like a lobbyist, and I didn't know it,'' said Lynch, speaking in his distinct Irish brogue.

Both he and his partner, John Clarke, grew up in a rural Irish parish about 50 miles from Dublin. They immigrated into the United States to pursue their dreams.

Lynch, 53, left Ireland in 1982 and first worked in sales before he became a waiter at the Coral Gables Country Club, then Christie's. Clarke, 58, left two years later and worked as a chef at The Biltmore Hotel. Backed by a couple of other Irish investors, they spent $1.5 million to turn a Greek restaurant and antique store next door into an 8,300-square-foot replica of the corner pub back home, complete with a private, back room called a ``snug.''

``We had decided, if we were going to do it in Coral Gables, then it would have to be a nice Irish place instead of what the perception of an Irish place was then -- sawdust on the floor,'' Martin said.

``We poured a lot of money into this at that time,'' Lynch said. ``But we thought it had to be suitable for a place like Coral Gables.''

Throughout the years, there have been talk of opening other JohnMartin's -- Miami Beach and Coconut Grove have been mentioned. But Lynch said he had been busy raising his family and getting the business going. Now there may be time for that, he said, coyly avoiding details.

He believes that JohnMartin's has set a new standard for Irish pubs, with its maple floors from an old Irish church, Irish artifacts -- antique golf clubs and family crests hang on the walls -- Waterford crystal chandelier and pillars of Brazilian mahogany cast in Ireland.

On weekends and some weeknights, musicians sing Irish folk tunes and sometimes stepdancers perform. The authenticity also extends to the menu, Lynch said, which was carefully crafted by Clarke, the chef.

``The quality of food we were putting out from the very beginning is a lot different than what you would find in an Irish pub,'' Lynch said.

The investment is still paying off. Lynch said the restaurant grosses between $2.5 million and $3.5 million a year. ``We're on the lower end right now,'' he added.

The best times, Lynch said, were in the mid-1990s.

``At that stage, we were the only act in town. There was ourselves and Doc Dammer's. Now that two or three chains have come into Coral Gables, it seems a lot harder,'' he said.

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