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Posted Dec 20, 2011, 7:01 PM
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Registered User
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Join Date: Jun 2011
Posts: 288
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Quote:
Originally Posted by 3940dxer
I've now read the whole Noir thread and am officially caught up. I'm a bit sad about it, because I've lost what, a month ago, seemed like a limitless supply of great photos and L.A. history. The good news is that I now know what I can contribute, without being redundant.
One topic I've had in mind has been Barney's Beanery in West Hollywood. Barney's began in Berkeley, but in 1927 moved to its current location at 8446 Santa Monica Blvd. (once a part of Route 66).
In the 1970's when I lived on nearby Flores St., Barney's was just a couple blocks away and I became a bit of a regular. With its pool tables and great jukebox it was a great place for a late night burger & beer, though the waitresses weren't very cheerful and generally forgot half of your order. I had a love-hate relationship with this place. Sometimes it was really annoying but the burgers were good and hey, in '78 I persuaded them to put Werewolves Of London on the jukebox. The wooden walls and partitions were stained by decades of cigarette and the bar was decorated in old license plates before they became a diner cliche. At times it had a slightly dangerous vibe. Along the east side of the building was the bar, and inside there you couldn't miss the old sign, prominently posted among the bottles that read FAGOTS-STAY OUT. The red matchbooks they gave out had the same slogan.
It seemed ironic and confusing because West Hollywood was heavily gay, and Barney's was a like the Cantina in Star Wars -- you really never know who might walk in the door. There were bikers, business men, actors, hippies, hookers, soul brothers, lost souls, hipsters, old timers, tourists. There were gay patrons too, and they seemed perfectly comfortable. Obviously the sign was not a statement of policy, but rather an artifact whose history was mysterious, at least to me. I think there were one or two old newspaper articles posted somewhere, but I never "got" what the sign represented, until I came across an article that explained the history of Barney's. I can't find it now, but...
From Wiki:
"Barney's location combined with fact that the owner was apt to extend credit and occasionally give away food made the bar popular with people from all walks of life including artists, writers, and other celebrities. Old Hollywood actors like Clara Bow, Clark Gable, Errol Flynn, Judy Garland, and Rita Hayworth were all regulars in their day. By the 1960s the neighboring Sunset Strip had become an important music center and Jim Morrison (who was reportedly thrown out of Barney's for urinating on the bar) and Janis Joplin (who had drinks at Barney's the evening of her death) became regulars. Poet Charles Bukowski lurked around, as did artists Ed Kienholz and others associated with the Ferus Gallery that was located nearby on La Cienega Boulevard."
Some snippets from Barney's long, strangely written history page:
"...Barney's Beanery took root in Berkeley, California. An L.A. native, John "Barney" Anthony attended U.C. Berkeley and enlisted in the Navy during World War I, serving his special blend of chili burgers and onion soup to soldiers...He opened his first Beanery, for men only, in 1920...moving to the current location in 1927.
...The area surrounding Barney's Beanery was primarily a huge Poinsettia field... "Discarded license plates above the bar were left by travelers, who came out to California to find a better life" claims Lauren Taines. "Their symbolic gesture was to leave the original plates of their home state behind at the diner."...In 1945, Hollywood Nightlife magazine noted the way in which Barney treated his customers, as if they were buddies from the service. "Barney Anthony is a name known to most writers who at one time or another have been broke in this town. Barney has always made sure that they have had food and just a little cash to tide them over."
...A 1942 description in Rob Wagner's Script describes it as "...a little wooden shanty, with a whole row of cheap floor lamps illuminating the counter, and a dinky little bar down at one end." The Herald called it "a shack, on Santa Monica Boulevard near La Cienega, which has not greatly changed since I dropped in there one afternoon in 1929 for a hamburger and root beer."
...In the fifties...the old-fashioned coach lamp hanging in front of Barney's Beanery has a gadget inside it installed by a radionics inventor from U.S.C." reported Bill Kennedy in his Mr. L.A. column in a '55 issue of the Herald-Examiner. "Operating like a radio-controlled garage door, the coach lamp is able to pick up radio beam signals from as far away as 25 miles. By prearranged signals, messages flashed from a unit installed on a patron's car can inform Barney just how many will be in the party, what they want to order, and how soon they'll arrive. Among the celebrities who have installed a Beanery Beam are Lou Costello, Wayne Morris, Donald O'Connor, George Gobel, Otto Kreuger and Gloria Jean."*
...Frequented by beatniks, rockin' teens and the likes of Charles Bukowski, the aging Barney showed his impatience with the homosexual element that came with bohemian culture. This was first pointed out by a 1958 Torch Reporter column titled "Barney's Unique Signs" that read "unique indeed - Bold, Black Letters on a Dusty Pink background read 'FAGOTS - STAY OUT' over the bar." It was an issue that was not soon forgotten, though one account in The Los Angeles Times seemed to deflate its importance. "Nobody ever paid much attention to it" claimed David Barry in 1977. "Barney's always had a regular gay clientele but it's not a pickup joint. In the old, crazier days the sign was a joke to a clientele in such advanced stages of social decay that gender seemed an unnecessarily picky distinction."
By 1965... nearby Sunset Strip was again the center of the action...Barney's Beanery was a natural magnet for people involved with the new scene...Marlon Brando to Jack Nicholson had gravitated to the art, jazz and rock 'n' roll scenes, and frequented Barney's...Two of the main figureheads from Los Angeles and San Francisco, Jim Morrison of the Doors and Janis Joplin of Big Brother & the Holding Company, respectively, became the celebrities most associated with consistent patronage of Barney's Beanery. Janis had a favorite booth; #34. Morrison had a penchant for teasing Joplin, and one incident commonly recalled is a catfight between the two, with the bawdy Joplin successfully belting the playfully demonic Morrison.
...In 1964, a Life magazine story on the emergence of the gay culture in public had featured a steadfast Barney posing in front of his sign. By the end of the decade, Erwin Held** had acquired the restaurant from the estate of Barney C. Anthony, who had passed away on November 25th, 1968. Erwin contested that he wanted to keep the place close to original, as he had obtained it...but on Saturday, February 7th, 1970, the Gay Liberation Front and other concerned organizations began picketing in front of Barney's Beanery, to have the "FAGOTS - STAY OUT" sign removed from the bar...he offending sign was removed in the mid-seventies and relocated to its current place in storage."
http://barneysbeanery.com/stories/history.php
*As an electronics engineer who well knows older technology, I doubt this system worked, or worked for very long.
** Irwin Held was an obnoxious ass. A friend once got his cheeseburger without cheese, and paid the bill minus the extra 75 cents. Irwin called the cops on him and there was a big scene in the parking lot. I found Irwin extremely unpleasant, and liked Barney's a lot more when he wasn't there.
Actually, I think the sign went up and down a few times over the years, and might have been replaced with a new version at some point. Rev. Troy Perry of The Metropolitan Community Church told the L.A. Times "We started picketing the restaurant in 1970, and on March 12, he said he would take the sign down, but then he put up more signs and had matchbooks [with those words on it] made."
I think the sign wound up at Hollywood City Hall, though Erwin probably longed for the days when it posted and enforced. I last ate there about 8 years ago. Erwin's gone and the place has changed hands once or twice. The current owners have morphed Barney's into a kind of diluted sports bar/diner franchise. Now there's even a Barney's in Burbank where I live. It's in the "date night" district, near the new movie theaters and cafes. But going there seems a hollow experience compared to the old Barney's -- even though it sucked sometimes.
And finally, Barney with his infamous sign, and a shocking quote not mentioned in any of the histories that I've seen. Yeah, he was a real sweetheart!
Life Magazine June 26, 1964, Homosexuality In America
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Great Post on Barney's Beanery 3940dxer!!!
I can speak from experience about the place. In late 75 or early 76 (sometime during our holiday break from school), a group of us FIDM students got together to attend a play that a schoolmate had designed and built the sets for. After the play, she suggested that we walk the block or so to Barney's becuase they had cheap beer and burgers. None of us had ever heard of the place, so we were game.
There was about 10 or 11 of us, as I remember, and one was a guy from Brazil named Richard (or as he pronounced it, Reechard). Richard was a life of the party young guy who was very animated and flamboyant. We sat down at two tables next to each other and a waitress came by, carded most of us, and then took our order for 2 pitchers of beer. Richard, as usual, started a lively conversation with the waitress and she stood there laughing and joking with all of us.
What seemed like an eternity later, she came back to the table and told us that "Bud" the manager said she couldn't serve us. We demanded to know why and she wouldn't say, she just nodded toward an older man behind the bar. Richard and Michelle (who suggested we go there) turned to face the guy behind the bar and asked for an explanation. He reached down under the bar and brought up the sign. Holding it in front of himself like a banner, he pointed to the sign, then at Richard and said "that's why, go somewhere else".
Richard, with his Brazillian hot temper flaring, went off at the guy in a mixture of portugese and english. You might not have understood him, but you got his point clearly. The old man put the sign down, came out from behind the bar and started menacingly advancing towards Richard. Never one to back down, Richard stood his ground, still letting the old guy have it verbally. Richard was not a big guy at all and the old man got right up in his face telling him that he was going to physically throw him out and beat the crap out of his "faggot ass" in the parking lot. That's where I came in, I'd heard enough!
The old fart must not have been paying attention when we first walked in, but he sure as hell did when I pulled my 6'7" frame out of my chair, pushed Richard out of the way and got in his face. I glared down in to his craggy old face and growled "how's about trying to beat the crap out of my faggot ass old man! Come on, let me drag your boney old ass outside?". The guy practically jumped over the bar trying to get behind it. Once he was securely back there, he yelled that he was calling the cops. We told him don't bother and left. Being 22 and angry as hell, I may have taken a leak in the potted plant out front but, then again, that could just be a vicious rumor
So, even though the sign wasn't "posted' during the mid-70's, it was still very close at hand. I personally have never been back to that hell hole and have no plans to either. Just had to comment, thanks again for the post.
~Jon Paul
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