Tuesday, September 1, 2009
Toobes Bar, Detroit Michigan (Gay bar)
Toobes was also located next to The Gas Station Bar on Woodward Ave and 7 Mile Rd. I did go inside once back in the 80's It really seemed even more like a "hustler" bar than The Gas Station. It was decorated with a bunch of plumbing tubes, etc. If you have any pictures or stories about this bar please post! We need to preserve this history!
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Tubes was Detroit's first video bar. It originally was the Outlaw, a leather/levi bar which had the hottest men and cruisiest backroom ever. Another fun bar,just north of the Gas Station, was the E-Ramp. That bar was famous for its hot spaghetti wrestling contests. You could park your car and spend all night bouncing between these three bars, whose back door entrances were only a few yards apart.
ReplyDeleteActually, the first gay bar in that building was called Cicero's Cellar I believe.
DeleteI worked at Tubes (actually, it was spelled "Toobes") when it first opened in 1983. I was 22 at the time, and had just come out less than a year before. It was Detroit's first gay video bar. Back then, I was hoping it would become Detroit's version of Chicago's "Sidetracks", but it never really got that popular. I still have some fond memories of it. I moved away from Detroit the following year. The bar closed a few years later.
ReplyDeleteMe again. I still recall some of the great early rock videos I saw for the first time at Toobes, such as "Shiny Shiny" by Hayzee Fantazee, "Hip Hop Bee Bop Don't Stop" by Mann Parrish, "Blind Vision" by Blancmange, and countless others whose names I can't recall now.
ReplyDeleteI also worked at Toobes for several years, after working at the Glass House. Both clubs were owned by Ed Fogman, who drove both of them to close. Toobes was a fun place, but the neighborhood just got too rough. It was located on 7 Mile Rd., just around the corner from The Gas Station. Yes, it eventually burned to the ground, but it had been closed for a couple of years before that happened.
ReplyDeleteI worked at the Crew's Inn, which became the Glass House after Ed Fogman purchased it. I left because I did not like him, and didn't want to work for him. I became friends with Scott, who was the manager of Toobes. When he talked me into bartending there, and I was eventually the Manage of Toobes for 3 years before Ed drove the place into the ground. When the "bar wars" started, and everyone was offering 2,3,4, drinks for 1, Toobes started .50 cent drinks on Wednesdays. I mad a lot of money there, but as with anything Mr. Fogman owned, he destroyed.
Deletenote to "I worked at Tubes (actually, it was spelled "Toobes") when it first opened in 1983. I was 22 at the time..." - did you have a very short haircut, and maybe a beard then? And maybe a roomate named Joe, who I think might have worked at menjo's helping with valet, maybe? (My memories might be mixed up, lol) - if so, I was an art major at WSU, and I took some pix of you - black and white - which I may still have someplace!
ReplyDeleteI did not hang out at Toobes very much-mostly went there to cool off from dancing at the Gas Station next door. I always thought it was cool that there were 3 gay bars right next to each other. I felt unjudged in that area-even though it was not a safe area of Detroit. But I survived and have some wonderful, crazy fun memories of those days in the 1980's. Anyone want to talk 80's let me know!
ReplyDelete