8 Fascinating Speakeasies that Helped the 1920s Roar

8 Fascinating Speakeasies that Helped the 1920s Roar

Larry Holzwarth - November 10, 2017

8 Fascinating Speakeasies that Helped the 1920s Roar
The Stork Club continued to operate long after Prohibition ended. In this 1944 photograph, Orson Welles is in the front left, smoking a cigar. Wikipedia

The Stork Club

Sherman Billingsley was a former resident of the federal prison at Fort Leavenworth Kansas when he arrived in New York with an eye for acquiring a chain of drug stores. Soon he was branching out and in 1929 he opened the Stork Club. Originally the club was a legitimate restaurant and nightclub in the front, where the display of secret hand signals would allow a patron, after passing the scrutiny of bouncers, into another room in the back.

In that room there was enough sin to cause a Temperance proponent to faint; liquor, gambling, dancing girls and something new to Prohibition – women drinking openly and freely in the company of men. For two years the club ran smoothly and without incident before the authorities raided the place in 1931.

Billingsley soon reopened the club on 51st Street, and operations continued until an angry patron complained to the police over losing money in a defective slot machine (some say it was only a quarter). The police had no choice but to follow up on the complaint and during the ensuing raid, they demonstrated their “respect” for the owner by allowing the patrons at the time to pay their tabs, collect their illicit gambling winnings, and leave quietly, before locking the clubs doors. The club would reopen in 1934 after the demise of Prohibition and remain in operation until the 1960s.

During its Prohibition days, the club was a favorite stop for the denizens of New York’s theater world. Columnist Walter Winchell retained a table at the club throughout the illegal years, calling it the “…New Yorkiest place on West 58th Street.” The Stork Club was famous for its discretion during Prohibition, shielding its well-known patrons from photographers and rumor-mongers, and their response was to provide the needed money to ensure that the local police, and the occasional feds, looked the other way.

Billingsley retained ties to what was called “mob money” during the early years of the club before the largesse of his customers allowed him to separate the club and its operation from the growing influence of organized crime in the mid-1930s. In a side note, his daughter-in-law, Barbara Billingsley, achieved fame portraying June Cleaver – mother of the Beaver – two decades later.

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