Cash in the Night

Nightspots are booming. From swanky Manhattan clubs to dingy San Francisco waterfront honky-tonks, the reports last week were all the same: business is 25% to 100% above last year and still growing. In many places the take is even above that of the Tinkling Twenties. Reasons: 1) a splurge by uniformed men and the New Rich--the flush war workers; 2) a rush by plain citizens to eat, drink and carouse for tomorrow is war.

In Manhattan, nightspots and boob-traps are roaring despite some 400,000 unemployed New Yorkers and a citywide dimout which has made Broadway the Great Dark Way. On the East Side zebra-striped El Morocco is open this summer for the first time in its ten-year history, and officers' caps are stacked six deep in the checkroom. At the Stork Club a hip-provoking rumba band helps lure 40% more business than last year. Nightclub-pocked 52nd Street jumps and jives until 4 almost every morning; famed Leon & Eddie's packs them in with come-ons like pretty chorines to dance with tired businessmen. The Hotel Astor roof has capacity crowds nightly and bar business is 65% above last year. In Broadway's flashy, pink-satined Latin Quarter, soldiers and visiting firemen ogle a sexy two-hour show, fork over a smacking $25,000 weekly for the look.

In Boston, fat pay checks from Massachusetts war factories have put new life into New England nights. Hundreds of people pack the Club Mayfair, the Satire Room. In the Copley Plaza's Oval Room business is 50% above last year; the popular Beachcomber recently doubled capacity to seat 650.

In Detroit, cash-heavy war workers are making a big splash, but mostly in noisy, smoky, gaudy places which look like overgrown Bierstuben. At the big Bowery Club trumpet-mouthed Martha Raye draws over 1,200 customers nightly to break house records. Almost all Detroit nightclub customers are factory workers; small individual checks are bolstered by a door charge. At the uppity Club Royale executives are coming back after months when they were too busy on war work to gallivant. Burlesque strippers disrobe before ever-growing audiences. Only complaint of the operators: kitchen help and waiters are hard to find, and harder to keep.

In Seattle, beer taverns, juke joints, dine & dance spots have twice as many frolickers as a year ago; everybody seems to have extra cash to spend, especially aircraft workers, longshoremen, sailors. Weekly gross at The Ranch runs up to $18,000, almost double earlier this year. At the Olympic Hotel youngsters jam the ballroom; about 90% of the boys are in uniform. In private clubs (only in clubs can liquor be sold by the drink) business has doubled, and clanging slot machines often pay all a club's operating expenses. Unlike most cities, Seattle revelers bypass cancan shows, prefer jugglers, acrobats, assorted vaudeville acts with their alcohol.

In San Francisco, heavy-spending shipyard workers have boosted nightclub business 30%. Mixed with the workers are thousands of sailors on leave and soldiers about to embark, all having one last fling. But regular socialite clubgoers are fewer. The fancy Bal Tabarin has dropped pate de jole gras, crepes suzettes, etc., from the menu, replaced them with plain English and a hot meat special.

In Suburbia. Against this boom in city places, tire and gasoline rationing has stretched the roadhouse business flat. Some clubs outside New York City, including the famous Westchester Bath Club, did not bother to open this summer; many that did are sorry. Even near Seattle, roadhouse business is close to zero--except for Saturday night. Up and down the whole East Coast the once-booming Howard Johnson chain of 192 restaurants fights depression. Total business this year will be about $15,000,000, one-half last year's record gross. Worried Howard Johnson figures at least half his eateries will soon be padlocked for the duration.

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