Old Detroit Bars

[Jody]

I would also like to see more pics of the third street area. Also would absolutely love to get pics of the brainard apartments as well as the 631 which was an apartment building on Selden. I have many memories of that area and I was just a stupid kid who didn't know any better than to walk around those neighborhoods [[I didn't drive). I learned very fast about life out there, and hung out with little Toni who was a go-go dancer. In those days it wasn't topless yet. We would get out of work at 2a.m. and she had a car so we would drive all over the place all night long, come home and sleep all day, then go back to work. She lived above George's restaurant across the street and to the left of the Willis.

[Jody]

OOPS!! The flight attendant dancer was Jane Harris, not Jean Harris.

[Wheels]

I would also like to see more pics of the third street area. Also would absolutely love to get pics of the brainard apartments as well as the 631 which was an apartment building on Selden. I have many memories of that area and I was just a stupid kid who didn't know any better than to walk around those neighborhoods [[I didn't drive). I learned very fast about life out there, and hung out with little Toni who was a go-go dancer. In those days it wasn't topless yet. We would get out of work at 2a.m. and she had a car so we would drive all over the place all night long, come home and sleep all day, then go back to work. She lived above George's restaurant across the street and to the left of the Willis.

Some Cass Corridor photos from that era here.

http://www.bruceharkness.com/chapter%20page.htm

[hupthousand]

There were several Taxi Dance places on Woodward, all of them on the second floor. I went to them in the late 50's after I got out of the army. No alcohol just pop and coffee was sold. You paid to get in and bought tickets to dance at a ticket booth at the top of the steps. The songs that played on a juke box were, it seemed, to be short ones. I was stationed in Germany in the service. The first woman I danced with in the Taxi Dance Hall was from Germany.

[RickBeall]

Great stories hupthousand and Jody. I hope this thread never dies.

And to second someone else's observation, I played pinball at Anderson's with a young lady who dressed in high quality business clothes and who as we yacked told me about how she stole all her clothes by stuffing them in her bag. Sounds like the same girl who was the secretary by day.

[gnome]

This is a great thread, I have not read it before but I sure hope Judy comes back with more stories.

[villagejack]

Reading all this is priceless... can anyone recommend any good current dive bars?

[gnome]

Tom's Tavern on 7 mile about 50 yards west of Wyoming. It is on the south side of the street and looks like it is just about ready to collapse upon itself.

Sketchy hours. If there is a truck parked in front on the sidewalk, it is open. To describe the place as a dive would offend dives, but the clientele range from judges and millionaires to carpenters, students, hookers and cops.

very safe.

[villagejack]

Thanks Gnome. I'll check that out!

[EastsideAl]

the name of the bar in the old house was Buddy and Jimmy's on Cass Avenue.

A picture inside Buddy and Jimmy's, showing Buddy herself and the "band" can be seen here:
http://books.google.com/books?id=p7G...etroit&f=false

Here's a vintage matchbook cover:



And here, weirdly, is a Buddy & Jimmy's birthday card, from a Facebook page about old Detroit postcards:

https://www.facebook.com/PostcardsFr...ef=nf&filter=1

[RickBeall]

Great pictures and links Al.

[jimmio]

I lived and worked as a desk clerk at the wilcrest hotel at willis and 3rd in 1980 and 1981 . rented rooms to Anderson garden patrons if you know what I mean. knew everyone around down there then and cant help but to wonder how some of them are doing now if they are even around.

[jimmio]

how do I retrieve messages? im new to this

[Lily]

Hi BodyBagging, it sounds like you should be the one sharing the great stories with us!

As a student, I remember Anderson's Garden as a notorious hooker bar in the 1970's. I also remember after that phase of its life was over I attended a presentation on the dangers of nuclear war that was put on by the 5th Estate political paper there.

the Fifth Estate....wow...old and almost forgotten memory in the Cass Ave, John Sinclair, Grande part of my brain

[RickBeall]

The Fifth Estate was still going strong in the early 1980's. I remember waling through Macenzie Hall and seeing Fifth Estate headlines that said something like "World Destroyed by Atomic War".

Come on Jimmio, give us some good stories!

I have a good story, but I can't tell it because [cough] it's about me.

[jimmio]

I worked the hotel desk at the wilcrest next to andersons in 1979 and 1980

[RickBeall]

That's a good start .... one night ....

[Frenchy]

Ugh! The smell of vomit and stale beer seemed to permeate the woodwork of those old corridor bars. the restrooms were even worse!

[Lotta Love]

Speaking of the Gold Dollar, Beulah is the old woman that ran the place and Norma was her daughter, the one that had her husband killed. I worker at the Gold Dollar in the last 60's and very early 70's. It was quite the place, some of the top Female Impersonators in the county worked there back in the day.

[jimmio]

I was desk clerk at the wilcrest hotel next to andersons

[gnome]

I like turtles.

[Fwrudedog]

This may be a strange thread but Growing up in Cass Corridor in the 1970s and having a Bar Maid/Manager for a mother, I was quite the little bar brat where I was constantly underfoot and running about. I met the most interesting people during those times and witnessed a lot of crap that most kids thankfully are never exposed to.
Just curious if any one has any interesting stories or pictures of any of these old Detroit bars.

Sabbs 2nd and Peterboro across from Forbidden city
Ducat lounge 2nd or 3rd st.
Sweethearts Selden?
Jumbos 3rd
The Envoy 2nd across from the Masonic Temple, was a quaint lil basement bar
The Horseshoe 3rd
Anderson Garden Temple near Cass
The Temple Cass near Temple
Henrys
The Golden Dollar Cass
Bob and Bettys 2nd and Mrytle- MLK
Charlottes Lounge was named something else prior to wife having her husband murdered Charlotte and Cass

I spent a great deal of my childhood in these bars, Honestly its doubtful that anyone will have much to say about them. The patrons are most likely all gone by now.

One bar you missed is the 414 Bar. On Brainard west of Cass Ave.

[Fwrudedog]

I would also like to see more pics of the third street area. Also would absolutely love to get pics of the brainard apartments as well as the 631 which was an apartment building on Selden. I have many memories of that area and I was just a stupid kid who didn't know any better than to walk around those neighborhoods [[I didn't drive). I learned very fast about life out there, and hung out with little Toni who was a go-go dancer. In those days it wasn't topless yet. We would get out of work at 2a.m. and she had a car so we would drive all over the place all night long, come home and sleep all day, then go back to work. She lived above George's restaurant across the street and to the left of the Willis.

Hey Jodi, here are some pics.

[Fwrudedog]

Here is a close up Jodi

[Fwrudedog]

I grew up in the Cass Corridor from 1956 [[Living at 3119 Cass Ave.) My mother was the apartment building manager. Moved to 443 Peterboro where my parents ran a rooming house until 1976. Wised up by then and got the hell out of Dodge.