The Purple Onion

The Purple Onion was a celebrated cellar club in the North Beach area of San Francisco, California, located at 140 Columbus Avenue (between Jackson and Pacific). With an intimate, 80-person setting, the club was a popular influence in local music and entertainment during the Beat era of the 1950s and 1960s.

1. History

The Purple Onion originally opened in 1952 under the management of Keith Rockwell. His sister and brother-in-law, Virginia "Ginnie" and Irving "Bud" Steinhoff would frequently work weekends at the club until 1960 when they took over management. Bud Steinhoff managed the Purple Onion until his death in November 1983. Virginia Steinhoff continued to operate the club until 1989.

1. = First-wave comedy and performance =

Notable entertainers who either got their starts or played the California club in the 1950s and 1960s include Bob Newhart, Lenny Bruce, Woody Allen, Alameda housewife Phyllis Diller (making her stand-up debut in 1955), Richard Pryor, Maya Angelou, The Kingston Trio, Jim Nabors, The Irish Rovers, and the Smothers Brothers—whose first album was titled The Smothers Brothers at the Purple Onion, but in reality, only the introduction was actually recorded there.

1. = Music venue =

Tom Guido became the club's manager in 1993. Under him it became the center of San Francisco's garage rock scene, featuring such bands as The Rip Offs, Spoiled Brats, The Trashwomen, The Makers, Tee and Thee Crumpets, The Phantom Surfers, The 5.6.7.8's, Brian Jonestown Massacre, The Groovie Ghoulies, The Go-Nuts, Guitar Wolf and many others. The club closed in 1999. Tom Guido died in 2019.

1. = Return to comedy =

In 2004, the club reopened and returned to comedy. Photographer and booker Dan Dion started a weekly comedy night that featured comedians such as Robin Williams, Paul Krassner, Jim Short, and Tom Rhodes. David Owen presented the debut of Mort Sahl in June 2005, and shows by Greg Proops, Zach Galifianakis, Margaret Cho, Todd Barry, Dan Piraro, and Judah Friedlander. By 2010, the club was only running weekend shows, though these shows were usually over capacity at 100–110 people.

1. Closure and reopening

In September 2012, the building was sold with "no plans to rescue". The club reopened in August 2014 as Doc's Lab and hosted both music and comedy throughout the week, until its closure in February 2018. The Purple Onion name was used from 2012–2018 around the corner with "The Purple Onion at Kell's" at 530 Jackson Street, a showcase of underground and Bay Area comedy acts on Wednesday and Thursday nights. The club reopened in November 2022 as Lyon & Swan, "a high-end restaurant with nightly live entertainment.". Lyon & Swan closed after only 11 months in 2023. "

1. See also

Hungry I Old Spaghetti Factory Cafe

1. References

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Columbus Tower (San Francisco)

Columbus Tower, also known as the Sentinel Building, is a mixed-use building in San Francisco, California, completed in 1907. The distinctive copper-green Flatiron style structure is bounded by Columbus Avenue, Kearny Street, and Jackson Street; straddling the North Beach, Chinatown, and Financial District neighborhoods of the city. Much of the building is occupied by film studio American Zoetrope, and the ground floor houses a cafe named after the company. The Sentinel Building is listed as San Francisco Designated Landmark No. 33.

Café Site remarquable

59 m

Hungry I

The Hungry I (stylized as hungry i) was a nightclub in San Francisco, California, originally located in the North Beach neighborhood. It played a major role in the history of stand-up comedy in the United States. It was launched by Eric "Big Daddy" Nord, who sold it to Enrico Banducci in 1951. The club moved to Ghirardelli Square in 1967 and operated mostly as a rock music venue until it closed in 1970. The name of the nightclub was reused later as a strip club in San Francisco, from the late 1960s until 2019.

Musique Vie nocturne

International Hotel (San Francisco)

The International Hotel, often referred to locally as the I-Hotel, was a low-income single-room-occupancy residential hotel in San Francisco, California's Manilatown. It was home to many Asian Americans, specifically a large Filipino American population. Around 1954, the I-Hotel also famously housed in its basement Enrico Banducci's original "hungry i" nightclub. During the late 60s, real estate corporations proposed plans to demolish the hotel, which would necessitate displacing all of the I-Hotel's elderly tenants. In response, housing activists, students, community members, and tenants united to protest and resist eviction. All the tenants were evicted on August 4, 1977 and the hotel was demolished in 1981. After the site was purchased by the International Hotel Senior Housing Inc., it was rebuilt and opened in 2005. It now shares spaces with St. Mary's School and Manilatown Center.

Charité Site historique

Comstock Saloon

Comstock Saloon is a historic saloon in San Francisco, California, located in San Francisco's North Beach. The building, since 1907, housed several different bars and owners. The predecessor being the San Francisco Brewing Company (1985–2012), which is the oldest microbrewery in San Francisco. The bar is named after Henry Comstock and for his Comstock Lode, and is currently owned by Jeff Hollinger and Jonny Raglin, both also bartenders for Absinthe Brasserie & Bar. The bar is preserving most of the building's history, including the interior of the building which has been remained unchanged.

Brasserie Vie nocturne