’Twas a lively “bull session” enjoyed by all on the Saturday afternoon of June 26. It took place in the former City Museum media theatre, which is now the auditorium of the Historical Society of Washington. The theatre is located in this writer’s favorite surviving downtown haunt, the former Central Library at Ninth and K.
Media wizard and all around “D.C. history freak” Jeff Krulik moderated a panel that included John Pagones, longtime Washington Post nightlife columnist, Mike Baker, bon vivant, and Vance Garnett, former nightclub entertainer. A continuous flow of images from days gone by, such as ads from Benny’s Rebel Room, the Blue Mirror and Casino Royal on 14th Street (“GIRLS! GIRLS! GIRLS!!”) flashed on a screen above us. These garish blurbs alternated with menus from Bassin’s, the Neptune Room and other places where sirloin steak and roast chicken hovered around $2 for a complete dinner!
The program was topped off with an amazing series of gorgeous, thought somewhat washed out, photos by Emil Press, who worked for decades as an inspector of D.C. sewers. Talk about “covering the waterfront!” Many in the audience recalled fond memories, including Capitol Rock author Mark Opsasnick, who reminded the rest of us that “Lizard King” Jim Morrison, leader of the ‘60s band The Doors, once held forth at an early art and poetry “slam” in Coffee and Confusion at 10th and K, and John Kelly, “Answer Man” at the Post, chimed in with fond recall as the vivid image of the ornate old Gayety Theatre came into view.
All of this re-informed this writer’s zeal to pursue his muse. For over 25 years I have struggled through privation and plenty to record the saga of the New York Avenue bus depots, Dolly’s Famous, the Terminal and Astoria Hotels, the Rocket Room, the Plain Brown Wrapper Bookshop and Kojac’s Carry-Out, the old marble lunch counter at F & W Grant’s 5 & 10 Cent Store and the rattle-trap Atlantic Building elevator. What’s it all about? Only a full-length feature film script about a Delaware rube named Billy Luck who stumbled into the D.C. nightworld one night in 1977 and catalyzed the whole dying beautiful scene.
The reference point for all this bizarre seething petri dish of the underworld seldom discussed even in scholarly works (with the exception of the amazing PORN ROW by sociologist Jack McIver Weatherford-Arbor House 1986) is that much of Billy’s story is taken from personal observations made at that time by Christopher Sky Earnshaw!
