"Pirate" Started Georgetown Nightclub that Became the Bayou: WP

[Dan T.]

The Bayou was a landmark DC rock venue for many years. From WPost's John Kelly:

Foreigner had its first U.S. club date at the Bayou. So did U2. (They opened for D.C.’s famed Slickee Boys.)

When it closed on New Year’s Day in 1998, the Bayou was the longest continually operating rock club in the city. But it didn’t start as a rock club.

Here’s a 1939 ad from The Washington Post announcing a new nightclub at 3135 K St. NW, formerly the site of a warehouse and car dealership: “They’re rarin’ to go mates, at Capt. Don Dickerman’s Pirate’s Den, that smart, unusual, breath-taking nite spot that has just opened its decks to the public. The 40 phantom pirates . . . the Main Deck, the Gun Deck and orchestra on the musical Poop Deck — the grand food, the potent drinks . . . the clever atmosphere promises ‘fun loving’ Washington the time of its life.”

The club was the brainchild of the fascinating Capt. Don, a man who believed he was reincarnated from a pirate. He dressed like one. He spoke like one.

He was absolutely obsessed with pirates,” said his granddaughter, Kathleen Popovic, who lives in Maine. Washington’s Pirate’s Den was a spinoff of Dickerman’s original in New York.

Kathleen couldn’t say for sure whether Errol Flynn backed the Washington club, although Bob Hope and Bing Crosby invested in the Los Angeles Pirate’s Den. (There was another in Miami.) Dickerman had a bit part in the 1940 Flynn movie “The Sea Hawk.” He was also friends with Johnny “Tarzan” Weissmuller and crooner Rudy Vallee. (Dickerman ran Manhattan’s Heigh-Ho nightclub, where he discovered Vallee.)

It appears the Pirate’s Den was around only for a couple of years. It eventually became an after-hours club called the Hide-Away, site of a mob hit in 1951. In 1953, the Tramante brothers and Mike Munley bought the building, renamed it the Bayou and turned it into a Dixieland jazz spot. In the early ’60s, it showcased burlesque. (Sultry stripper Julie Gibson was a mainstay.) By the mid-’60s, the Bayou had switched to rock.

With a capacity of 500, it was the largest rock club in the city for a time. Over the years, acts including Dire Straits, Warren Zevon and the Romantics played there, as did local acts, such as the Nighthawks.

The Bayou seeded some interesting careers. In 1964, a Navy ensign named Mike O’Harro started sponsoring Sunday singles nights at the club. He went on to found the Champions sports bar empire.

Mr. T was a bouncer at the Bayou. “Another bouncer,” wrote The Post’s Richard Harrington in 1998, “reportedly invented the Plexiglas bong.”

Article: http://www.washingtonpost.com/local/2011/07/10/gIQAAEveII_story.html

Don Dickerman was a wild dude:

http://restaurant-ingthroughhistory.com/2008/12/09/anatomy-of-a-restaurateur-don-dickerman/

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I was in Georgetown this past weekend. The Cellar Door nightclub is now a closed "Philadelphia Mike's." The site of the old Desperado's is now the Ukranian Embassy.

[Destructis]

Wow, interesting. I spent a lot of time there in the 80's. I also used to hit Crazyhorse. Is that still around?

[Dan T.]

BTW, the photo above shows Capt. Don with his 5th wife. He had 13 wives in all.

“There was one of his wives who he was married to for two hours,” his grandaugter Dottie recalls. “He got married and then he just left her at Grand Central Station.”

[Kosher Ham]

I don't believe that the "Mr. T" was a bouncer at the club.

[Teller]

I opened this, hoping for a Bill Mazeroski story.

I leave disappointed.

[Rocky21]

I'm sure a bunch of yous remember. The Bayou was an epic, epic night club.

Kiss played a gig there in the mid-70's within a year or two of forming. The Foreigner gig was waaay after they were popular. And although some historians get it confused U2 (in their first US club gig) opened for The Slickee Boys, not the other way around. Kevin Costner jumped on the roof in a scene from some movie with Gene Hackman. My buddy was upstairs drunk one night, took a wrong turn and ended up hanging out with John Lee Hooker. I saw Bo Diddley play guitar there and high fived Ron Wood. on the same night.

[Dan T.]

Wow, interesting. I spent a lot of time there in the 80's. I also used to hit Crazyhorse. Is that still around?

Crazy Horse is right there with Cellar Door and Bayou on the list of bygone Georgetown locales.

Favorite Georgetown music moment: Saw the Nighhawks playing at Desperado’s. Nighthawks lead guitarist Jimmy Thackery is jamming a guitar solo, goes off stage and out the door. Some people followed him out. We can still hear him playing out on the sidewalk. Pretty soon the guitar music comes back, only it's George Thorogood. On that same night George Thorogood and the Delaware Destroyers were across the street at Cellar Door. The bands worked out a deal that at midnight they would both play “Madison Blues.” Thorogood and Thackery each started their guitar solos, went off stage, outdoors, stopped traffic and met in the middle of M Street, jamming. Then they plugged their guitars into each others' cables and went back into to the opposite nightclub to finish the song with the others' band.

[Rocky21]

Crazy Horse is right there with Cellar Door and Bayou on the list of bygone Georgetown locales.

Favorite Georgetown music moment: Saw the Nighhawks playing at Desperado’s. Nighthawks lead guitarist Jimmy Thackery is jamming a guitar solo, goes off stage and out the door. Some people followed him out. We can still hear him playing out on the sidewalk. Pretty soon the guitar music comes back, only it's George Thorogood. On that same night George Thorogood and the Delaware Destroyers were across the street at Cellar Door. The bands worked out a deal that at midnight they would both play “Madison Blues.” Thorogood and Thackery each started their guitar solos, went off stage, outdoors, stopped traffic and met in the middle of M Street, jamming. Then they plugged their guitars into each others' cables and went back into to the opposite nightclub to finish the song with the others' band.

Wow. You would have been pissed if you stayed home that night.

[China]

I don't believe that the "Mr. T" was a bouncer at the club.

It is well known that Mr. T worked as a bouncer early in his career (mostly in Chicago). In fact Sylvester Stallone spotted him on a TV show called Games People Play in a best bouncer contest and cast him in his film Rocky III. Whether he spend time as a bouncer at the Bayou isn't 100% clear, but a Google search turns up a couple of references to it, in addition to the article in the OP:

http://www.wdchumanities.org/docs/08grants/bayou.pdf

Bye-Bye Bayou: Georgetown Nightclub Closes Door Tomorrow Night

[bird_1972]

[Predicto]

You people need to visit this place:

http://www.826valencia.org/store/

I too have good memories of the Bayou and the Georgetown club scene. Even my crappy fake ID was good enough in the late 70s.

[Mad Mike]

Kind of reminds me of this guy...

[Dan T.]

The Nighthawk's Jimmy Thackery is one of the finest guitar players I've ever heard. I remember he used to collect signatures of musicians on his guitar . The back of his guitar was covered with the names scratched into the wood. I found this account of that:

He first asked Carl Perkins to scratch his name on it, and "he whipped out about a 6-inch buck knife, and went to town on it. had all kinds of people sign this thing over the years. Some of them were blues people, some of them were just great players that I just admired."

Those names include Otis Rush, John Hammond, Bo Diddley, Jimmy McCracklin, Stevie Ray Vaughan, Buddy Guy, Jimmy Rogers, Willie Dixon, Paul Barrere from Little Feat, Son Seals, George Thorogood and Elvin Bishop. Instead of scratching, Willie Nelson used a black marker.

B.B. King nicked his name into the pick guard because he didn't want to mess up "a fine musical instrument." Thackery could always replace the pick guard, he reasoned, if he decided he didn't want King's signature on there. Thackery laughs in disbelief.

The guitar belonged to his former roommate Chris Donald, guitar player in Sha Na Na, whose widow sold it to Jimmy for $310. It's been broken in half and fixed with a dowel rod. The head stock has been broken three or four times and repaired.

"This thing is a death ray. It is the loudest, most god-awful raunchy sounding thing you will ever hear, just tear your face off," he says.

Though Thackery has several guitars, since the mid-1980s, he's been playing a 1964 Fender Stratocaster L-series he bought in perfect condition for $700. He's worn down the finish - a red and yellow sunburst edged with black - to the alder wood beneath.

"Over the years I have hot-rodded it, butchered it, beat it to death and carried it all around the world. And what you see is what is left. But there's nothing that sounds as good as this old piece of crap. It's got a soul to it that nothing else comes close to having."

It was stolen once in Kansas City, where he was playing a festival. It was the one night he decided he was too tired to haul the gear up to the hotel room and instead chose to just "pray to the big note" that it would be safe. A guy short on cash for drugs broke in and took the guitar and other gear.

Though he figured it was just gone, his Kansas City fans are fierce. They made fliers using photos of the guitar from past performances and took them to pawn shops and music stores. The "crackhead in question" came into the music store that provided the gear for his show, and the guy behind the counter was a fan and very familiar with the guitar. Thackery got his guitar back two weeks later.

"It's perfect for me. It's perfect for no one else. You probably couldn't get $400 for it in a pawn shop. But to me, it's worth everything."

http://www.arkansasonline.com/news/2009/may/19/jimmy-thackery/

[Destructis]

Kind of reminds me of this guy...

Dude, that's Wash!!!!

I wonder what Kaylee would have looked like as a pirate.

[A Walton]

The Bayou was epic. I will always have good memories of that place. It was my first 'live music venue' and it changed me forever. I remember seeing Dave Matthews there for like 8 bucks when I was 20.

[Gracelander]

My favorite club from the 80's. Saw so many great bands, my favorite memory is seeing Guns N Roses on the Appetite For Destruction tour, I think it was either Halloween night or the night before. Axl gave me five as he walked by and I thought that was the coolest thing haha . I've washed my hands many a time after that.

[Rocky21]

http://www.wdchumanities.org/docs/08grants/bayou.pdf

Great link China. It's ridiculous to think of the performers that played in a club that size.

Aerosmith, the Police, the Ramones, Tammy Wynette, Roy Orbison,

Professor Longhair, Bon Jovi, Muddy Waters, Blood Sweat & Tears, Stevie Ray Vaughan, the B-

52s, Steppenwolf, Stephen Stills, Eddie Murphy, Sam Kinison, The Cure,

John Lee Hooker, Spirit, Joe Jackson, Hall & Oates, The Guess Who,

Todd Rundgren, Eddie Money, Root Boy Slim, Carl Anderson, Bob

Seeger, Duran Duran, Roomful of Blues, Bad Company, Dave Mason,

Captain Beefheart, the Marshall Tucker Band, Southside Johnny, NRBQ,

Molly Hatchet, the Nighthawks, Peter Tosh, David Bromberg, Pat

Metheny, the Pretenders, Johnny Winter, Pure Prairie League, Talking

Heads, Jerry Jeff Walker, Iggy Pop, Bryan Adams, Randy Newman, the

Motels, Face Dancer, Bruce Hornsby, Hootie and the Blowfish, Blues

Traveler.

[Dan T.]

Great link China. It's ridiculous to think of the performers that played in a club that size.

Aerosmith, the Police, the Ramones, Tammy Wynette, Roy Orbison,

Professor Longhair, Bon Jovi, Muddy Waters, Blood Sweat & Tears, Stevie Ray Vaughan, the B-

52s, Steppenwolf, Stephen Stills, Eddie Murphy, Sam Kinison, The Cure,

John Lee Hooker, Spirit, Joe Jackson, Hall & Oates, The Guess Who,

Todd Rundgren, Eddie Money, Root Boy Slim, Carl Anderson, Bob

Seeger, Duran Duran, Roomful of Blues, Bad Company, Dave Mason,

Captain Beefheart, the Marshall Tucker Band, Southside Johnny, NRBQ,

Molly Hatchet, the Nighthawks, Peter Tosh, David Bromberg, Pat

Metheny, the Pretenders, Johnny Winter, Pure Prairie League, Talking

Heads, Jerry Jeff Walker, Iggy Pop, Bryan Adams, Randy Newman, the

Motels, Face Dancer, Bruce Hornsby, Hootie and the Blowfish, Blues

Traveler.

Dayum. Hell of a list.

NRBQ best bar band evah.

[Koolblue13]

I work (and kind of live) at what is currently the longest running, continuously owned rock and roll club on the east coast. Maybe the country. John and Peters place.

http://www.johnandpeters.com/history.html

Therogood used to live in the band room and host open mic night. Allegedly, the song Sultans of Swing is about it. Pretty cool.

They are doing a documentary about the punk joint I use to go to, City Gardens, in Trenton. John Stewart worked there for a bit. That place was amazing.

http://i24.photobucket.com/albums/c41/Skiz1/DCXX/riot.jpg

There are so many amazing little hole in the wall rock and roll clubs across this country. AC/DC was right, rock and roll will never die!

[USS Redskins]

Thats awesome... snuck in there with fake id's for several Ramones shows in the 80's.... also climbed on the roof to listen to a few shows when the id's didnt work. Think I saw the local band Kingface there, too... they kicked ass.

Thank god they took the ID at the 930 club no questions asked... (also they took it at Shepards Park, the strip club at the tip of the diamond of DC, right over the line from Silver Spring - anyone know that place?)

Remember the scene in the Kevin Costner film, No Way Out? He jumped off the raised highway onto a tree right outside the Bayou - the agents chasing him jumped onto the roof.... then he ran down the canal in Georgetown and into the fictional Georgetown Metro stop...

Bayou was a great place to party.

[A Walton]

Aerosmith, the Police, the Ramones, Tammy Wynette, Roy Orbison,

Professor Longhair, Bon Jovi, Muddy Waters, Blood Sweat & Tears, Stevie Ray Vaughan, the B-

52s, Steppenwolf, Stephen Stills, Eddie Murphy, Sam Kinison, The Cure,

John Lee Hooker, Spirit, Joe Jackson, Hall & Oates, The Guess Who,

Todd Rundgren, Eddie Money, Root Boy Slim, Carl Anderson, Bob

Seeger, Duran Duran, Roomful of Blues, Bad Company, Dave Mason,

Captain Beefheart, the Marshall Tucker Band, Southside Johnny, NRBQ,

Molly Hatchet, the Nighthawks, Peter Tosh, David Bromberg, Pat

Metheny, the Pretenders, Johnny Winter, Pure Prairie League, Talking

Heads, Jerry Jeff Walker, Iggy Pop, Bryan Adams, Randy Newman, the

Motels, Face Dancer, Bruce Hornsby, Hootie and the Blowfish, Blues

Traveler.

I caught John Poppers harmonica at the Blues Travelers show back in the early 90's. It is sitting in a box with my hacky sac and incense sticks.

---------- Post added July-19th-2011 at 04:33 PM ----------

Remember the scene in the Kevin Costner film, No Way Out? He jumped off the raised highway onto a tree right outside the Bayou - the agents chasing him jumped onto the roof.... then he ran down the canal in Georgetown and into the fictional Georgetown Metro stop...

Hell yeah....not to far from the M street stairs from the Exorcist.

[Destructis]

LOL while we are geezing about Georgetown, lets not forget Hammerjacks in Baltimore. Another great place to see live music.

[Kosher Ham]

LOL while we are geezing about Georgetown, lets not forget Hammerjacks in Baltimore. Another great place to see live music.

Hammerjacks was a good spot, but still not like going to the Bayou.

China, I know Mr. T was a bouncer, but I don't think he was at the Bayou or in DC (I could be wrong). The georgetown scene back then was a little underground and a lot of people rocked mohawks and stuff. Commander Salamander was a must see spot back then.

[Gracelander]

I used to just love going there and drink the coors beer they served. They played Shook Me All Night Long quite a few times on the stereo speakers. Then they had this band that I saw there so many times, I think they were a local band but they seemed exactly like Poison with the big hair and pretty boy singer, wish I remembered their name. Also watched the Redskins Superbowl there, then spilled into the streets of Georgetown to celebrate. I miss those times.

[youngestson]

Wow, interesting. I spent a lot of time there in the 80's. I also used to hit Crazyhorse. Is that still around?

Wow. I hadn't thought of Crazy Horse in years. It was a pit, but had some great bands.

And after reading that article, how wild is it that U2 opened for The Slickee Boys?

(The Slickees were awesome by-the-way)

---------- Post added July-19th-2011 at 11:26 PM ----------

LOL while we are geezing about Georgetown, lets not forget Hammerjacks in Baltimore. Another great place to see live music.

A buddy of mine from high school had a bumper sticker that looked for all the world like the Hammerjacks one but read HerpesJacks. Very subtile and funny as hell.