MOTT - Custom combiners couldn't have picked a worse time to show up in Mott with dirty clothes.

The southwestern grain town will host as many as 150 custom cutters in the coming days, but there won't be anywhere in town for them to wash their undies.

The blame for that goes to the state's new anti-smoking law, which went into effect Monday.

Dennis Laches, owner of a television repair and laundromat, posted a sign on the door that said he's closed up shop because of the new law.

Even an intercession by Mott Mayor Troy Mosbrucker on Tuesday afternoon didn't change his mind.

Laches, 59, a smoker himself, said if he can't legally smoke in his own building, he won't keep it open.

The laundromat owner said the business barely paid its own bills anyway, but if he can't be there all day like he usually is to keep an eye on the water pipes and fuse box, he won't be there at all.

Mosbrucker tried to persuade him to open it a couple of hours a week for the custom cutters, at least, but Laches said they should blame the inconvenience on state leaders, not him.

Laches regularly entertained a group of Mott fellas, who convened for coffee, cards and a smoke or two in the morning.

Now, that's history, too, although Laches does point out that he can smoke in his building if he wants to, now that it's closed.

"I'm not a rich person, and in six to eight months, I'll be destitute," he said.

Laches' is the first reported business door to close in North Dakota because of the anti-smoking law.

The nearest laundromat is less than 15 miles away in Regent, but good luck finding an open washing machine there.

The number of custom cutters who pull into that grain town with their harvest machinery and camper trailers makes Catholic-dominated Mott look like a Sunday school picnic for Baptists.

Jan Altendorf of Altendorf Harvesting said Laches' decision is very devastating.

The crew of 30 she brings works 12 to 18 hours a day and they only get a few hours to run their clothing through the wash, maybe a few more if it rains.

Altendorf said the crewmembers don't have their own transportation, so they walk uptown to the grocery store, laundromat and wherever else they need to go.

Now, she figures she'll have to assign transportation and if the workers end up in Dickinson, well, everything's fair game.

At that, a furrow of worry crossed the mayor's brow,

"They'll get to Wal-Mart (in Dickinson) and buy everything," he said.

Altendorf said custom cutters, who hail from Africa, New Zealand and London, typically leave about 20 percent of their wages behind in towns from Texas to Canada.

She expects the inconvenience will be prolonged this year, because it looks like crop ripening will be slow and custom cutting crews will be around into September.

Laches said it wouldn't have mattered to him if the local police never showed up to write him a ticket.

The law's the law, he said.

After 17 years, "The state has taken my business away," he said.

Hettinger County Sheriff Terry Marigny said he doesn't plan to go looking for smokers in places like laundromats and elsewhere.

But if he gets a complaint or if he encounters smoking where it shouldn't be - and that's any place open to the public, excluding bars that don't have a restaurant license, or have a permanent wall between the food and liquor areas - he'll have to enforce the law.

Laches said for $10,000, he'd sell the building, lock, stock and wash barrel. He'd sell the washing and drying machines for $2,000.

He gets $1 a wash load because that's all the coin boxes are set up for and they're expensive to replace.

As he drove off from Laches' place on the shady gravel roads of West Mott, Mosbrucker was talking about getting some guys together to buy machines and set up a laundromat somewhere in town.

Perhaps some enterprising teens or stay-at-home moms will step forward and make a few bucks doing custom cutters' laundry at home.

Unless something is done, Mosbrucker said Mott will have a continued problem for the locals and the hunters who will be coming in come October, who depended on the laundromat.

Mosbrucker said the new law will affect other Mott businesses and he's hoping to get clarification on how bars that grill steaks will be treated in the anti-smoking law.

"It's a struggle to keep businesses open in these small towns and they (the state) shut 'em down," Mosbrucker said.