McGuire's

It was a hard job. This particular part of it would take many hours yet, and Vito the workman, built like a tight end, sweat dripping from his chin, stood on the bar and ripped at the insides of this dumb-waiter that for years had blocked customers from being served at one end of the bar.

"Tough job, Vito," Johnny McGuire, the owner, said.

"Tough job," Vito grunted.

"You want a drink, Vito?"

"No, I got to keep goin'."

Johnny McGuire stared at his drink.

The place was closed and he was alone; he dreaded later on, when the place would be open and crowded. Johnny had turned his saloon, Pep McGuire's saloon on Queens Boulevard in New York City, into a gay bar, and, like any decent Irish Catholic from the borough of Queens, he was terrified of homosexuals. Here in the gloom of the afternoon, watching Vito work, Johnny McGuire reached for his best companion, depression. To do this, to wrap himself in vacant pain, he merely had to think of any part of the magnificent life that he had led.

For years, he and his partner had spent all their time and energy on gambling. One day they turned around to find that their great saloon business now consisted of a few guys talking about who caught the football or how many home runs Mantle hit in his best season. Soon, Johnny McGuire was trying to pay his Shylocks with no money, something the Shylocks considered to be poor form.

So Johnny McGuire went the only way there was to go, turn the place gay. Gay lives are geared to going out at night. For one thing, few of them have to watch kids. All the other people, all the straight people in a place like Queens, New York City, stay home and watch television with the police dog. The streets are left nearly empty and thus seem more unsafe. Frequently, it seems you are left only with gays twirling through the night on their way to drink and song.

Johnny's problem, trying to be at ease among gays, was made worse by outside pressure: His family and friends seemed to think he was doing something terrible. Which kept Johnny suspended in alcohol. He was a great natural promoter. For his place to last--gay bars change rapidly--he would have to put in all his energy and ability. But none of his friends would talk to him anymore, and he didn't know whether to sell the place or kill himself. And now he sat at the bar and worried and watched Vito work.

"Care for a drink now?" Johnny said to Vito.

"I better just keep goin'."

Johnny looked at his watch. It was 5:30. By eight o'clock, customers would be in the place. He was glad Vito was with him. At least he had somebody he could relate to. Vito's thick arms tore at the insides of the dumb-waiter.

Johnny McGuire comes out of Rockaway Beach in Queens. His parents owned a saloon and raised three sons, two of whom became famous: Dick McGuire, a great backcourt man with the New York Knicks, and Al McGuire, the winning coach of Marquette University. Johnny McGuire had one drawback to athletic prominence: He had no talent. When he came back from war, from the Great War, his leg in a cast, he said he had been shattered by flak over Berlin and had been given many medals. His mother knew that he had broken the leg while mopping the gym floor at an air base in Nebraska. She promptly ordered Johnny to work behind the bar, leg in a cast and all.

With this background, Johnny did what he was supposed to do: He became badge number 6783, Police Department of the city of New York.

One day in the fall of 1953, Johnny was put on a four-p.m.-to-midnight post guarding the entrance to UN Ambassador Henry Cabot Lodge's suite at the Waldorf Towers. Threats had been made on Lodge's life by Puerto Rican nationalists. Johnny, exhausted from a hard day battling early races at Aqueduct Race Track, pulled up a chair to Lodge's door and sat on it. It was warm in the hallway. Johnny took off his hat, mopped his wet hair and left the hat on the floor. Soon, the gun on his belt felt too heavy. Johnny took off the gun and placed it on the floor under his hat. Then Johnny clasped his hands and went to sleep.

A great flash awoke him. Here, walking away from him, was a photographer from the New York Daily News. Johnny yelped. The photographer began running and Johnny tore down the hall after him. Johnny's shouts brought a lieutenant to the scene. Johnny confessed sleeping on post to the lieutenant. The lieutenant then explained to the photographer that this young patrolman would lose his job if the picture appeared. The photographer said, all right, let's go back and get another picture. Once, people were able to make a few human judgments; today this could never happen; today the photographer would be committing some sort of crime. For the next picture, Johnny McGuire stood at attention at Henry Cabot Lodge's door. It was a great picture of a New York cop, fine-looking tough Irish lad, protecting one of our officials from unseen foreign evil. The picture made the front page of the Daily News. Here was intrepid Officer McGuire; here he was, standing at attention but with no hat on and no gun on. The precinct captain took one look at the newspaper and assigned Johnny to a fixed post, which meant he could not walk more than ten yards in any direction and that he was to be checked by supervisors every two and a half hours.

At this time, Johnny was hanging around, for purposes of gambling, one Norton W. Peppis. Blue-eyed, fashionably dressed, Peppy was the most prominent New York Jewish gambler since the late and very great Mendel "Sugar Plum" Yudelowitz. Peppy became upset when he learned Johnny was assigned a fixed post. "That's like making Eisenhower do guard duty!" he shouted at Johnny. "Turn in your suit. You're too big for this."

Johnny became the first guy from Queens I ever knew to voluntarily give up the great prize: a police pension. A few years later, he and Peppy opened Pep McGuire's and it was the times, the Sixties, and their energy, having jockeys ride race horses into the place at night, that made it go. "We can't miss at anything we do," Peppy said.

But what they soon were doing mainly was gambling. They had $5000 on a horse called Hebrides, which won by a length at Aqueduct and would have paid better than two to one if the stewards had not decided to disqualify the horse for cutting another off. In the dining room at Aqueduct, Johnny McGuire put the track program into his mouth and took a bite. Half of the money they had bet was over the phone with a bookmaker. The bookmaker was one of those people who become violent if they don't get paid. As Johnny McGuire chewed and swallowed paper, Peppy told him, "Don't worry, we'll win the next."

At Madison Square Garden, a basketball game, they bet Boston and gave Detroit five points. Near the end, Boston was ahead by five and Bill Russell rushed to the basket and put it in. This put Boston out by seven. Peppy and Johnny ripped off their shirts in joy. They nearly missed the referee's calling a charging foul on Russell. The basket did not count. The lead was back to five points. Detroit went downcourt. Johnny McGuire, covering his eyes, heard a great shout in the arena as a Detroit player threw in a shot just before the final buzzer. This made the number three. The bet now was lost. Johnny McGuire went out into the street and hung over a trash basket. The play had cost him $7500.

"Don't worry, we'll get them back," Peppy said.

On a cold Sunday morning in December of 1968, Peppy and Johnny were in the saloon, counting receipts, when a guy named Stanley came in. Stanley was the night doorman at the Summit Hotel on Lexington Avenue in Manhattan. At five in the morning, Stanley saw Joe Namath come out of the hotel with a bottle in one arm and a blonde on the other. Namath was to play for the Jets at Shea Stadium that day in the American League championship game against tough Oakland.

"Nobody can go against whiskey and broads all night and then go out and play football," Peppy said. "Don't tell me what saloons can do to you. This dizzy kid don't have a chance today."

Peppy and Johnny grabbed phones. They berated bookmakers who tried to (concluded on page 168)McGuire's(continued from page 154) flinch at large numbers. By afternoon, they had $60,000 bet on Oakland against the Jets. All of New York gambling heard about the bets and wondered what Peppy and Johnny McGuire had on the game. "We got plenty," Peppy sneered. At Shea Stadium late that afternoon, Joe Namath went to the left side line on his own 42. He threw a pass into the winter wind and cold and gloom. He threw from his own 42 down the field and clear across it to Don Maynard, who caught the ball at the side line on the Oakland 10 and went to the six. People still maintain it was the greatest pass ever thrown in football. On the next play, Namath, rushed, threw the ball as fast as a baseball past three Oakland defenders and into Maynard's stomach. The touchdown won the game for the Jets.

"We're going to make it," Peppy said. Johnny did not answer. He went to a doctor that night with severe chest pains of undetermined origin.

They borrowed $40,000 from a Shylock at the interest rate of two percent per week. The Shylock was from the Jewish mob, and he was as big as a refrigerator. Every Monday night they were to pay $800 in interest to the Refrigerator. If they did not pay, the Refrigerator would swing his door into their faces.

The two borrowed money from a second Shylock and bought into a horse called Assignation. When the horse ran at Santa Anita, they bet $10,000 on credit with a bookmaker who could be nasty. Late in the afternoon, Lazdro Barrera, the trainer, called from the track in California.

"The horse dropped dead," Laz said.

"That's all right; he probably needed the race. We'll bet him next time," Peppy said. Johnny, paling, felt new twinges in his chest.

"No, the horse actually dropped dead," Laz said.

Johnny had a hand over his mouth as he headed for the men's room.

Two years ago, Peppy became gravely ill. He died staring at the telephone in the hospital room.

Johnny McGuire was left with a shutoff notice from the gas company, implied threats from the Refrigerator and five guys at the bar arguing over Tom Seaver of the Mets. Johnny tried to hold out, but he could not do it the old way, boys and girls.

Now, alone at the bar, watching Vito work, Johnny was confused. He needed his old enthusiasm to keep the place alive. But how could he have any drive when everybody was telling him, "How could you have your family name associated with such a thing?"

"What time is it?" Vito asked.

"Seven fifteen," Johnny said.

"What if I stay another hour?" Vito said.

"Fine," Johnny said. Bartenders were setting up for the night. Customers would be in soon and Johnny wanted one straight guy around him on this night. While gay saloons have to be cleaner than the average saloon--Johnny's bartenders were busy placing flowers around the bar--he knew customers wouldn't mind some chipped plaster as long as it signified something that soon would be more pleasing architecturally.

"Now, you understand that the people coming in are a bit gay," Johnny said to Vito.

"Won't bother me," Vito said.

"I just don't want you getting upset," Johnny said.

"Don't worry, I can handle anything," Vito said.

Vito the workman worked on, black hair matted, face and arms glistening with sweat.

The first knots of customers glided into the saloon. Foremost among arrivals was Dominguez the Hairdresser, hips and arms writhing to the music filling the place. Dominguez the Hairdresser had short cropped black hair, earrings for pierced ears and a counterful of jewelry on his wrists and fingers. Dominguez smiled happily to the music. Then Dominguez saw Vito the workman.

"That body is not to be believed," Dominguez said.

"What did you say?" Vito glared down.

"I said, that body simply is not to be believed."

Vito was down from the ladder, work boots thumping on the floor, hands out to destroy. Johnny got an arm between Vito and Dominguez the Hairdresser.

"Vito, come on, now, I told you. That's the way it goes," Johnny said.

Flames went out in Vito's eyes. He shrugged, grunted and went back up the ladder.

Dominguez the Hairdresser tossed a shoulder. "Primitive straights!" He flounced to the far end of the bar.

A half hour later, Vito came down from the dumb-waiter. "Now I could use that drink."

"Terrific," Johnny McGuire said.

Vito had aquavit with a bottle of Tuborg Beer as a chaser. This is a combination that could put a hole in the Grand Coulee Dam. "Give us another," Vito kept saying.

Alcohol relaxed Vito. The gays arriving, waving, blowing kisses to one another, holding hands, pecking didn't bother him as they would if he were sober. Johnny McGuire was saying how the gays, when out in the street, were somber and troubled. "The whole world gets on them, you know. These guys are oppressed."

Vito agreed. He had another aquavit. Halfway through the beer, he looked down the bar. "Hey!"

"Yes, hon?" Dominguez the Hairdresser said.

"I want to apologize and buy you a drink."

"Why, of course." Dominguez slid down the bar. Vito said he was sorry, he had been a little tired. Dominguez said, don't be silly, everybody has problems. Why, only yesterday, there were these six women in to have their hair done all at once and when they began complaining about the wait, Dominguez exploded. "I told them," he was saying to Vito. "I threw the comb down and I said, 'Fuck you all.' And I walked out."

"That's how to tell off anybody," Vito said. "Good boy. Have another drink."

Johnny McGuire started to talk about news from Rhodesia. Vito never noticed him leave. When Johnny came back, Vito and Dominguez were talking about watches. The bar was crowded and Johnny could only get an elbow in. "Let's have a drink," he said.

"I'm just dying for a joint," Dominguez said. "Care to join?"

"Absolutely," Vito said.

He walked out to smoke on the sidewalk, walked out as if he didn't know Johnny.

The place was crowded by now and Johnny, half stiff with whiskey, lost track of time and motion. He did not know how long Dominguez and Vito stayed out on the sidewalk. But the next time he saw them, it was obvious that whatever the whiskey had not done to Vito, the pot had. Here were Vito and Dominguez, out there on the dance floor, Vito's eyes rolling, head rocking, work roots thumping on the floor.

"Anybody who doesn't like what I'm doin'," Vito roared to Johnny, "if they don't like it, they can go and----"

"It's Vito's coming-out party!" Dominguez squealed.

"They can go screw!" Vito roared.

His work boots thumped on the floor and Johnny McGuire ran to the bar and pushed through for a drink. The hell with people, he told himself, he was going to run the liveliest gay place in New York.

Dominguez captured die costume-ball prize at McGuire's last July. He went as a pineapple. Vito was seen in the gay-liberation march at the Democratic National Convention. And in Queens, Johnny McGuire's place is so big with gays that now he is known as the King of Queens.