McSorely's Wonderful Saloon

In sporadic moments of interest over the last year, I have been chipping away at Joseph Mitchell’s collection of New Yorker essays Up in The Old Hotel. The first in the anthology is McSorely’s Wonderful Saloon, Mitchell’s character study of McSorley's Old Ale House, the oldest Irish pub in New York City, and its patrons. This past weekend, I finally sought out the bar for myself and wrote of my experience:

April 6, 2019

Javier has been slinging two-for-two darks and lights here for twenty-five years. The two legendary brews, made in the basement during prohibition, supposedly taste exactly the same now, even after being passed around through half a dozen breweries in the city.

The group portrait on the wall behind me includes two men with notably fake mustaches; there are playing cards pinned to the ceiling. There are endless things to look at on the walls in here: The décor is exactly the same way Bill McSorley left it, the memorabilia bolted in place to preserve his father’s bar. Newspaper articles and awards and military caps and helmets and buttons above the center archway and Native American faces peering out from behind the bar and wishbones from decades of Thanksgiving turkeys hung over the center of the chandelier. Relics from the long, storied history of the Bowery.

I feel as though I stepped both back into the past and into an alternate universe. Time passed strangely as Frank and I sat there in the corner of the front room, ordering round after round and making friends with the visitors from San Diego and Los Angeles seated across from us; Mike and Chris, brothers. The cheese plate is comprised of thin slices of probably Monterrey Jack and a sleeve of saltine crackers. I like the continuous clink of glasses as the tenders of the rooms constantly collect empties and return them to the bar.

The woman with grey hair and dark eyebrows and a white collared shirt is forever cleaning glasses behind the counter and then setting them out to dry. She looks immaculate in such a time-worn establishment. Forty years ago, neither she nor I would have been allowed in here; now she’s permitted to work the counter and I’m permitted to drink and wait in line for the ladies’ room. The sawdust on the floor keeps me from slipping up after seven half-pints.