If the idea of entering a time machine holds the slightest fascination for you and one of your destinations would be a trip to old New York during the Roaring Twenties, go to 57 East 54 th Street , walk four steps down and back into time. For once you pass through the hand-carved swinging doors and enter the famous Silver Dollar Bar, you’ll find everything just as it was back in the mid 1920’s when Bill Hardy first converted this five-story brownstone into one of New York ’s most prominent and celebrated speakeasies.

One is immediately bathed in nostalgia upon entering this room as priceless photos of prize fighters and thoroughbred race horses adorn every inch of wall space embracing with warmth the antique bar and hand sculpted back bar. There’s even an antique cash register, rounding out the theme.

Whereas the first floor of Bill’s is all sports memorabilia, (it was originally for men only), the second floor is a museum to the world of entertainment. This high-ceilinged dining room, with its overhead oak beams, also boasts not an inch of empty wall space with posters and photos dating from the mid 1800’s to the famous Gay Nineties. You’ll see everything from an autographed Buffalo Bill poster, to century-old playbills, to a bevy of famous Ziegfield girls, to a very young Al Jolson in this one-of-a-kind collection of “who was who”.

The third floor, The Tenderloin Room, is for private parties only and it also features a finely crafted bar. As the legend always had it, this bar was converted from a fireplace in the old Rockefeller mansion but recently that legend was altered when Bill Hardy’s widow, (herself a former Ziegfield girl), celebrated her 90 th birthday at Bill’s and was reported to have said with authority, “Oh no, dear, that bar came out of the old Delmonico’s”.

Bill’s Gay Nineties features live piano on the first floor, (Monday night through Saturday), a deliciously hearty menu for both lunch and dinner on the first two floors, and good stiff drinks wherever you are.

Bill Hardy must be proud of the tradition which has been upheld due to the more than capable proprietorship for the past twenty seven years of Barbara Bart. For in the June, 2006, issue of Esquire Magazine, Bill’s Gay Nineties made the celebrated list of being one of “The Best Bars in America ”. So stop in with a friend, Friend, belly up and drink in old New York .

The History

With the landscape of New York watering holes changing seemingly by the hour, and the classic saloons which spawned this tradition all but a distant memory, it’s heartening to know that Bill’s Gay Nineties has stood the test of time. Just as it did in the mid 1920’s when it stubbornly defied the powers that be and opened its doors as a “speakeasy” during Prohibition, this jewel in the crown of Roaring Twenties nightlife continues to defy the powers that be (progress now and development) while holding its sacred ground for a clientele, in some cases, four generations old.

You’ll find everything just as it was in Bill’s, unchanged and unspoiled, except for the faces of those who carry on the tradition. In fact, the only significant difference between now and “then” is that you probably won’t get caught up in a raid!

When it was a residence…

The address at Bill’s Gay Nineties has always been a well known destination. Originally a private home built in the 1850’s, this five-story brownstone claimed as its very first tenants a Mr. Robinson and his family, himself a man of the cloth whose parish was just around the corner. Reverend Robinson was a noted composer, as well as a minister, which instantly brought recognition to the building which housed him. He managed during his tenure to publish countless songs and hymns including “1865 Songs of the Sanctuary” which issued over a half million copies.

Next to take up residence at this upscale address were a Major Clement C. Moore and his wife Laura Williams. Laura was a socialite and Clement had been a major in the Civil War. They owned residences as well both in Newport and Paris, but here was where they preferred to call home, especially during Yuletide, for Clement was the grandson of the famous Clement C. Moore who authored (as a gift to his grandchildren), A Visit from St. Nicholas, the perennial favorite which begins with, “’Twas the night before Christmas.”

The last tenants to claim this address, before its swift transition into a speakeasy, were a Mr. and Mrs. George Butterworth, both prominent New Yorkers, also active in music and affairs of the parish. George enjoyed playing the organ up in the second floor parlor when he wasn’t acting as trustee for The Cathedral of St. John the Divine. And, just like the tenants preceding him, this pastime continued the grand tradition of music being a mainstay within these walls. It’s turned out to be a fitting tradition for music to this very day is the signature at Bill’s. Six nights a week someone is singing and tickling the ivories… the ghosts of Christmas past must be proud!

When it was a speakeasy…

There’s an uplifting adage that goes, “When something bad happens God is closing a door but opening a window.” Well, in 1924, Bill Hardy took that adage literally and reversed it. He boarded up the windows and opened a door, and thus began the legend that is Bill’s Gay Nineties.

Having been a boxer, a jockey, a dance instructor, a Broadway dandy and married to one of the Ziegfield girls from the legendary Ziegfield Follies, who better than Mr. Bill Hardy to launch such a New York enterprise?

He knew everybody that was anybody from each of his past professions, (not to mention the world of politics and the underworld), and his dabblings in each of those worlds had provided him access to and the procurement of one the most widely admired photograph collections in the world. The walls of this once private home soon became a glittering tribute to the past, and a hallmark to the future of what would be. Evoking the “Gay Nineties” as his theme, and also the name of his speakeasy, Hardy immediately exhumed the careers of many famous vaudevillians and hired them to rework their magic for a whole new generation. And it worked. (It would be like opening a retro 50’s place today and hiring a bunch of Doo-Wop groups to perform.)

At its height, Bill’s featured three floors of rotating entertainers doing their act on one floor, taking a break, then moving on to the next. Every night was a party at Bill’s and every table a part of it, for the infectious group sing-along which permeated the air was as alluring as the illegal hooch in the glasses. Yes, ringing the buzzer, whispering the password and entering this glorious era of New York nightlife, was simply the thing to do back then and Bill’s was at the forefront of that era. And, just for the record, the police were “all” the wiser.

After Prohibition Bill’s Gay Nineties was often mentioned in many of the high profile columns of the day - Walter Winchell, Hedda Hopper, Jack O’Brien - stating who had been at Bill’s and who did what. The most celebrated “who did what” was the infamous brawl that made all the wire services between writer/actress Adela Rogers St. John and the entire wait staff at Bill’s. Yes, nothing had really changed for the place when the drinking ban was lifted because, unlike most other speakeasies (of which there were over thirty thousand), Bill’s was more than a boarded up joint to buy booze. It was, (and is to this day), a classic New York nightclub in the grandest tradition.

Bill’s today...

Even though we’re in the new millennium, you can still get a taste of the old when you walk into Bill’s. It starts with Aldo Leone, (the manager and official greeter), who has been with the place for over forty five years. Whereas the walls at Bill’s are a pictorial history, Aldo is an oral history of New York City . He’s seen it all. And when he isn’t at the racetrack, which he visits every waking day of his life, he’s standing by the swinging doors at the entrance to the Silver Dollar Bar, regaling an eager customer or two with his yarns. Aldo’s great aunt was the famous Mama Leone and it was in her restaurant he sharply cut his teeth. Starting there as a busboy in his early teens, he met everyone from Al Capone to President Eisenhower and forged with many a life-long acquaintance. Aldo’s mother, when she wasn’t working in Mama Leone’s, also cooked at the training camp of Rocky Marciano, so Rocky was also among Aldo’s famous intimates.

But the most important constant at Bill’s spreading warmth and good cheer both day and night, (and by two degrees of separation a link to Bill Hardy), is the proprietress for the past twenty seven years, Barbara Bart. Barbara’s father, O.B. Bart, purchased the business in 1965. After his untimely death in 1979, Barbara handily took over the reins and along with her partner, Jack Sheehy (former Cornell basketball great, class of ’55), has been the driving force of its success ever since. That means that Bill’s Gay Nineties, going all the way back to 1924, has been owned by just two families, the Hardy’s and the Bart’s, and with the mortality rate of restaurants being what it is today, that in itself is a bit of a New York legend.