tangents

news & views

by del mcintire

NEW YORK CITY which we have reported as suffering from the closing down of a tremendous number of bars during the past year and the early months of this one, seems at last to be experiencing an easing of the pressure. However, a good source of information in N.Y. writes that things are still pretty tight. Our informant describes the current situation as follows:

"New bars are opening up all the time and not too many are closing -at least not as many as earlier. The Blackwood, a supposedly 'membership' club is reported to be closed, but The 14th Street Cafe . . . The Club... The Twenty-Second (if it has a name) . . . The Top Hat Bar ... are all operating. Note that all of these places are (I believe) within the confines of one police precinct. The New Campus Restaurant . . . is the new elegant bar, situated so as to be convenient for the ribbon

fone

clerks. But it is only busy on Friday and Saturday nights. During the daytime it is entirely straight and proper. Lots of businessmen and

women.

"One or two other places are operating. . . In the Village, Cherry Lane Bar, which connects with Cherry Lane Theatre, is open again. Also operating in the Village are the Theatre De Lys Bar... Frisco's

and last but not least, The New Colony has reopened rather quietly in its old location . . . The New Colony is just a block away from The Old Colony and has the same 'management', Duke and Sal who look just like their name-sound prototypes, or archtypes, of Italian Mafia. The location of the Old Colony is now 'Duke's Pizzeria.'

"With the exception of the New Campus, all of the non-village bars are rather raunchy. They get crowds of young fags and not a few