Honest Trav’s Virtual Dive Bar is a Facebook group that was created to safely hang out with friends and enjoy a few drinks during the beginning of the pandemic.

However, it evolved into much more than that.

The group, spearheaded by Lehighton’s Travis Lindenmoyer, eclipsed 96,000 members last month. But every great success story has a few bumps in the road.

Facebook shut down the original dive bar group, which featured countless members, content, threads and communications.

“Facebook’s community standard policy isn’t necessarily geared toward having a 21-and-over group or anything like that. They have artificial intelligence, algorithms and a huge team of people that are out there trying to make sure whenever any of what they say their community standard violations occur, that groups or users are penalized,” said Kirk LaRose, the group’s media representative.

“Unfortunately, we racked up some violations that were just misunderstandings whether it was just trash talk about sports or a picture of someone drinking a beer by the pool that they thought was a little too revealing. … Within our group, we do a good job of removing stuff and removing children and underage users.”

But Lindenmoyer and LaRose - who are childhood friends - and the rest of the team didn’t quit. They made a new group, which is already rapidly expanding. The dive bar crew doesn’t want any misunderstandings or members thinking that they were removed from the initial page for no reason.

“As a lot of people know, Facebook shut us down, no big deal,” said Lindenmoyer. “We had about 100,000 people in there before. We started the new page about two or three weeks ago and got about 30,000 back so far.”

During its first year of existence, Lindenmoyer’s project has proved to be much more than simply just another Facebook group. It’s an important outlet for many people - many kindhearted, generous people from across the world.

“We raised over $17,000, and about 65 kids had Christmas that wouldn’t have had Christmas without all people that contributed,” Lindenmoyer said. “It was a proud moment to see all of these families we affected - from a page that people think all we do is shotgun beers. It’s much more than that.”

At one point, the near 100,000 members reached every state in the country. The dive bar also features many members outside the United States as part of its community. Lindenmoyer’s local idea very quickly became worldwide, and the virtual dive bar started to become something tangible.

Saucony Creek Brewing Company and Pub teamed up with him in December 2020 to release Honest Trav’s Dive Bar Ale.

Ian Scott, general manager of Saucony’s Kutztown location, said his team brewed 90 barrels of Trav’s first beer.

“Trav reached out to us about the whole thing,” Scott said. “We sat down and chatted about making a series of Honest Trav Dive Bar beers.

“Since the virtual dive bar helps so many people connect when all of the bars and restaurants were shut down or takeout only - this still allows everyone to feel a part of the over 90,000 members connect and stay together during an unusual time.”

On Thursday morning, Trav’s second beer, Honest Trav’s Dive Bar IPA, was canned and released at Saucony Creek.

“We started with an easy drinking white ale for the first beer,” Scott said. “This batch is an American-style IPA, brewed with only the finest of hops - Simcoe, Cascade and Centennial.

“While home, avoid cenosillicaphobia by stocking your fridge heavily with this dive bar exclusive. We have plans to have more canned dive bar beverages in the works for the warmer months.”

Lindenmoyer said he never thought he’d have his own face and name on a beer, but he’s excited and it’s humbling.

“Local people can find my beer at Dunbar’s (Dunbar Bottling),” Lindenmoyer said. “Lehigh Valley people can find it at Shangy’s (Emmaus), Tango’s, Nevulis and all major distributors. If your distributor doesn’t have it, tell them to ask for it.”

A one-year anniversary party in honor of the dive bar is scheduled for March 27 at One Center Square in Easton. Tickets are required.

More group plans are anticipated for the summer, pending loosened state restrictions.

“The amount of friends that this group brought together, the amount of relationships that this group brought together - life is all about relationships,” Lindenmoyer said.

“There are a couple of dive-bar babies on the way and there’s a couple of marriages that may happen out of it. We brought people together at a time where you couldn’t go outside, and now there are stronger friendships and bonds.”