The Coffee Houses of America

An old European custom with a new American accent has taken hold on both Coasts and at a few hip points in between. This is that rallying place of beat intellectuals, the coffee house, which -- from obscure sproutings in Greenwich Village at the end of World War II -- has mushroomed in big cities and college outposts into a five-million-dollar-a-year business. The mushroom has roots deep in Old World culture, for Samuel Johnson and his Boswell cracked their wisest in the coffee houses of 18th Century London, and the very word café is, of course, just the French way of saying coffee. But unlike modern cafés, the American coffee house of today seldom serves anything stronger than coffee.

It's pretty strong coffee, of course; the black and bitter Italian espresso made of dark, heavily roasted beans and brewed under terrific steam pressure in gleaming imported machinas, but the principal intoxicant in these houses is not the beverage but the customers.

These customers are of two stripes, as is the decor of the two separate and distinct kinds of coffee house in business today. There are, first of all, the shabby hideouts with cracked walls and carefully nurtured cobwebs in the corners. Here, earnest, unsmiling talk about poetry and politics and the meaning of life is uttered by bearded boys and lipstickless girls, to the background of a listlessly plucked guitar. Beat poets recite beat poems. A broke bohemian can, in the Continental tradition, nurse his single cup of espresso all evening with nary a prod from the waitress. Greenwich Village, of course, abounds in such places: Caffè Reggio, Café Roué, Caffè Bongia and Figaro Café, to (concluded on page 95)Coffee Houses(continued from page 43) name just a few. In San Francisco, Matt Vidaver's Tea Room and Coffee Gallery is an outstanding example.

Then there are the lush, luxurious coffee houses with glittering crystal chandeliers, deep-pile carpeting, and walls filled with good, sometimes valuable, paintings. In these, the talk is livelier, if shallower; frequent smiles are flashed; and the nursed cup draws frowns from the management. The beat atmosphere prevails here, too, but it is all tongue-in-chic. The girls wear make-up; the boys wear suits; beards are less prevalent. Hi-fi music -- cool jazz in some, Vivaldi and Bach in others -- is a staple cushion for the chatter in many places, be they beat, mezzobeat or plushly beat. Coffee houses of this more glamorous genre include Serendipity 3, Orsini's, The Coffee Mill and Caffè Ristorante Ca d'Oro in New York, Il Piccolo Libresso, Vienna Coffee House and D'Oro in San Francisco.

Although the coffee is of secondary interest in a coffee house, most menus offer endless and exotic variations on the basic espresso; Caffè Chocolaccino, Cappuccino, Crèma di Colombo, Caffè Cordoba, and so on, variously spiked with cinnamon, hot milk, chocolate, eggs, whipped cream. Straight espresso customarily costs about a quarter or 35¢; the fancier versions may run as high as a dollar. Usually available to those the TV commercials call the "over-coffeed" is a cup of cocoa or a glass of lemonade. Pastry, cheeses, relish trays and hero sandwiches are often to be had, too.

The American coffee house has brought with it a beat mating technique reminiscent of a Jules Feiffer cartoon. The robust, hyper-hearty approach that may work in a bar fails every time in a coffee house, claim those who have made out in both milieus. "You have to play it cool in the coffee houses," they say, "you can't just walk in and take over. You become part of the scene, see, and the chicks dig you, and you're on your way." The typical, if apocryphal, case of a fellow we'll call Jason has been cited:

Jason, legend has it, picked out a coffee house popular with cute but mixed-up girls. He strolled in unobtrusively, quietly placed his order, and sat alone in a corner, peering sullenly into his gradually cooling Cappucino and "acting inner-directed and withdrawn, see?" It wasn't long before a warm, low feminine voice husked in his ear: "Is anything wrong?..." After a few Leave-me-alones from Jason, the girl was hooked. "Oh, I know your problem so well," she assured him, "and I can help you ... I can help you prove you're a man!" And she did, although Jason had needed no proof.

Coffee houses now spottily span the continent -- they can be found in Philadelphia (Artist's Hut and Humoresque), Chicago (Café Bellini), Detroit (New Bohemia Club and Barbaro's) and the numerous campus hangouts -- but the areas of highest concentration and interest are New York City, San Francisco and Los Angeles. The Los Angeles houses cater largely to hopeful male and female starlets who yearn to crash films; hence, the highest percentage of nubile femininity is on tap in such L.A. coffee houses as Cosmo Alley and the Unicorn.

Herb Cohen, who owns these two in partnership with actor/folk-singer Theo Bikel, says of coffee house clientele, "There has always been an out-group. There is one now. This group is no different than it always was except that today it is called the Beat Generation. This out-group is the in--group at the coffee houses. At the Unicorn, it consists of students, Hollywood hopefuls (talented and untalented), writers, dancers, models and painters. The majority of the people, though, are those who are dissatisfied with society but don't know exactly where their dissatisfaction lies. Like all suffering people, they want someone to suffer with so they make the coffee houses their homes. Each coffee house has its own in-group. Not necessarily creativity, but understanding will get you into one of these groups. A tourist is anybody who is not a member of the coffee house in-group. He can live next door to you and still be a tourist."

Beat comic Mort Sahl has become the champion and the symbol of the American coffee house. Although he performs in the gin mills, he hangs out in the java joints, prowling them in the wee hours after work, drawing from them and their customers much of his incisive, insightful material. In addition to material, Sahl says he is seeking God in the coffee houses. Those who know him best insist he isn't kidding.

Whether he is or not, Sahl's idea of a beat church with an espresso machine as its altar creates -- better than anything else -- a vivid image of what the coffee house has come to mean to an important segment of today's American urbans.

Left, New York: the Bizarre earns its name from its Greenwich Village following and the quality of its wall paintings.

Above, San Francisco: at the Coexistence Bagel Shop in North Beach, unofficial headquarters for the beat movement, a couple ponders the conformities of the world of "tourists."

Right, Hollywood: the Cyrano, among the more ornate klatch-havens, thrives on a clientele made up largely of showbiz people.

Above and above right: in Greenwich Village, the Rienzi was one of the first coffee houses to gain popularity. On weekdays, villagers and guests meet for sketching, reading and unconventional conversation. On weekends, however, the self-defeating popularity often forces the management to discourage everything except very rapid coffee drinking.

Above and above right: in Greenwich Village, the Rienzi was one of the first coffee houses to gain popularity. On weekdays, villagers and guests meet for sketching, reading and unconventional conversation. On weekends, however, the self-defeating popularity often forces the management to discourage everything except very rapid coffee drinking.

Left: actress Fay Spain engages in earnest conversation with husband, painter John Altoon, at the Venice West, in Venice Beach, California.

Above: court jester in the kingdom of the sick is Lennie Bruce, holding forth at Cosmo Alley, Hollywood, to jazz accompaniment.

Right: in the Insomniac at Hermosa Beach, a group of beat poetasters pays oral homage to Howl, the magnum opus of the beatniks' poet laureate, Allen Ginsberg.

Right: a hangout for New York University students like Jackie Valensi, Figaro Café, Greenwich Village, offers facilities for enjoying the omnipresent entertainment of the beat world, chess.

Several beatniks uncooled enough to vote Maggie Ryan "Miss Coffee House." Our camera caught her at the Insomniac, Hermosa Beach, California.

Peripatetic humorist Mort Sahl visits one coffee house after another on his nightly, after-performance rounds. Here pictured at the Chez Paulette in Hollywood, Sahl avers he's seeking God in these ground beaneries, also says he often finds sharp new material for his act.