The food was all American dishes, and I used to go there for dinner all the time. You can get food here until 2am, so keep this place in mind for drinks and a bite after a show at the Beacon Theatre a block away. Amsterdam Ale House plays sports on a few TVs, but it feels less like a sports bar and more like a casual neighborhood spot than any other place on this stretch of Amsterdam Ave. If their children were found playing on the street unsupervised that would warrant a call to 311 or Child Protective Services. 133 E. 65th St, New York. The 24th Precinct has about the same racial and ethnic makeup it did when Lyford published his book in 1966. Tags: Big Nick's Burger and Pizza Joint, East Village Eye, East Village in the 1980s, Lou Reed, New York City 1984, old pizza parlors New York City, Upper West Side in the 1980s, Velvet Underground Wish my kids could have a similar space to grow up, warts and all. They have over 30 beers on tap, many of which are unusual options from relatively small domestic and international breweries, and the space tends to fill up with big groups drinking and sharing bar food. And the biggest, most heartbreaking loss la fortuna, hangout of John and yoko. Get the latest in beer, wine, and cocktail culture sent straight to your inbox. Maybe before you retired you might have offered a no-credit seminar on at-large behavior and minding ones own business. You should know to never start a sentence with but. Ive lived as far north as 110th street and as south at 80th. Today: About 90% of the mom and pop stores on Broadway between 91st and 85th St. have closed. Its the only nabe Ive lived in in Manhattan. Nestled on the Upper West Side, Bodega 88 features many big screens behind the bar and smaller individual screens at every booth. 4) Someone else mentioned it, but Ill second a nod to Teachers and Teachers, Too. There are so many more as I have lived here since the early 70s. Police flooded the area. You can drink one at the L-shaped bar in the corner, or you can grab a little table along the wall. I only have one photo taken on the street in the1970s but I do remember alot of the old stores. 5) There was a little magazine stand on the west side of street around Columbus and 83 or 84 was it called Johnnys? The infamous Upper East Side murder has yet to fade from public memory. Three conservative synagogues in a 15-block radius from 100th Street to 86th Street had fallen into decrepitude and near-dormancy. On the northern end, it borders W.110th street down south to Columbus Circle at W.59th street. 1. 1. e's Bar 511 Amsterdam Ave., nr. I live in a small city in the midst of a great city. . Also, there are many Duane Reades and banks, but the claim that almost every mom-and-pop business has been shuttered is simply false. What sets it apart is the fact that there are so many hard-to-find beers on tap. Columbus and Amsterdam avenues were to be avoided though we had to cross them to hang out in Central Parkmostly by the fountain. My high school boyfriend lived on 82nd and Broadway. Does anyone remember the trendy bar in 1981-84 at the corner of 74th and Amsterdam? Was the place called Amsterdam. Bars/clubs 1980's Show more . We also went to the park alone which kids nowadays hardly ever do. According to a 1966 study, out of 150,000 residents, 105,000 were white (of whom 40,000 were Jews); 26,000 came from Spanish-speaking homes; and 18,000 were black. Coolsingel Street Cam, Rotterdam. I remember Marcys deli on Broadway, the barbershop next door with its old -fashioned spinning stripe pole. Bars & Music Mama's Bar. (I had mussels, he had short ribs). My building paid for our own doorman out of our own pockets to try to secure our building. Get there early (around 9:00 p.m.) to experience it because it gets a bit crowded near the stage later in the evening. Huge packs of kids just playing in the park after school or even at lunch (with a letter you could leave 87 or 44 and go get a slice somewhere). You want to watch sports with some friends, and maybe share a couple pitchers of beer - ideally something other than Hoegaarden or Goose Island. The rental apartment upstairs from my mother, with the same layout was recently listed for $9900.00 a month. But murder, like cancer, was rarely preventable. Charlie Chop-off was never caught. They have an enormous scotch selection, a large number of snifters, and plenty of Irish and American whiskey as well. Think about it. I shopped at Red Apple Market on 100 st, which then became C Town and now is yet another bank. Stephen Hanson's uptown "Chinese" fantasy, which he bravely launched on the un-trendy Upper West Side, was the big box that spawned all of the city's pan-Asian giants. Via (Photo credit: Steven Siegel) A man wearing a placard on Times Square, around 1980. It did. Of course I have lived elsewhere, including the Adirondacks (for college), the Catskills (for work with Goddard-Riverside Community Center residential summer camps) and Dallas, TX for work. We neighborhood kids came to call him, with the horrible bluntness of adolescent boys, Charlie Chop-off. The Cozy Bar (The Dead Poet) Williamsburg is like New York in the 70s. Shakespeare and Co. followed suit a few years later due to the same pressure from Barnes and Noble. This is exactly what I am looking for. Not how it was for me, my friends, and their families. I remember The Jaunting Car Inn next to the Ritzs deli between 71 and 70th on Columbus. Big Nick's Burger and Pizza Joint at Broadway and 77th Street. Email me if you want to answer a few questions. Are the changes to the neighborhood for the better or for the worse? I miss the 88 Noodle House, Woolworths, and Sloans. At the same time, community groups planted trees on every block and strove to make it all look nice. When I moved to West 83rd Street, pushers hid their crack vials in the planters outside the building I lived in. Does anyone remember a clothing store on Amsterdam Avenue around 75th Street that was huge, with floor-to-ceiling windows, that catered mainly to gay men back in the 1980s? I can just smell the place writing about it. In 1983, a sociologist named Richard Shafer told the New York Times, The West Side is a neighborhood that always seems to embarrass the fashionable. Its most attractive streets were and are no match architecturally or decoratively for the boulevards of the East Side, Fifth and Park Avenues. Now no reason was needed at all. Find next available. Amazing roast chicken at Amsterdams. At least when talking about fairly genteel nabes as we are here. There are a few things that differentiate Bodega 88 from the other sports bars in the neighborhood. at least up until the 90s. The bakery was Royale, there were others as well, Eclair, and Blooms. Is that what a Harvard education gets you these days? I am currently working on my graduate school thesis and have decided to write about how the Upper West Side has changed in my lifetime. While any such demolition of livable housing stock would be greeted with cries of horror today from poverty advocates and landmarking experts, the policy was stronglyadvocated by neighborhood clergy, who had high hopes that the struggling poor could make a better life in public housing. A short-lived club in the 1980s East Village. Several times a year the 79th Block Association shut down the street and organized a street fair. Theres a NY Times article published on June 8, 1979 call Discovering the Pleasures of Columbus Avenue Published a couple of months before I moved to Columbus and 74th where I am now. Download Upper West Side Nyc stock photos. There was a really cool restaurant on NW corner of 94th st, whose name escapes me but the name was carved out of the building itself. Meanwhile, the working poor found themselves menaced and increasingly overwhelmed by the burgeoning welfare underclass. but that would be the pot calling the kettle black. Living outside the neighborhood & city in recent years, I admit, has allowed me a greater perspective on the losses the UWS has undergone. the bar next to them. Thanks for posting this article. Vin sur Vingt | Best Things to Do Upper West Side. Finally, the kind of restaurant the Upper West Side has long been starved for. From the outside, this place looks like a very normal pub - and on the inside it looks pretty normal, too. 2 All-American Burger Kai L./Yelp It is the same one in which I grew up four decades ago, and its buildings and landmarks and topography are almost entirely unchanged. Sure there were some muggings (mostly stealing our bus passes) but nothing serious. If you want anecdotes, thats one thing; Im happy to provide them. Arts & Entertainment. And Silk Road. Over 25 years, we lived in 3 apartments, none more than 4 blocks from Fairway. And within those classes there was division as well. Some memories: Best upper east side bars 80\\\'s in New York, NY. (There werent many rich people on the Upper West Side then, a situation much altered today.) There is a scene played for laughs where Marsha Mason gets mugged in broad daylight on a tawdry looking Columbus Avenue yes a a movie, but it was absolutely blamable at the time. Use this guide to find all the best bars in the neighborhood. Booked 152 times today. Yellow Rose of Texas. It's interesting to watch the shifts in neighborhoods. Neighborhood volunteers took turns watching out their windows, reporting any crimes to the well-meaning, over-worked and understaffed local police precinct. Now that the doormen from CPW no longer drink at the bar at Pizzeria Uno on Columbus & 81 (which had a cubby hole in the unfinished end where wed leave each other messages and little presents), thats one thing that Im finding difficult to nail in the neighborhood! What about doing a simple Lexis-Nexis search? Im coming into this conversation very late but I have lived in this neighborhood all my life.since 1953. Last Spring, a year ago this month, I watched as a staple of the neighborhood closed, Food City. @Janet, I agree. Within 18 months, several more "singles bars" were opened on 1st Avenue. This place also does Happy Hour deals every day until 8pm, including half off the whole bar on weekdays and half off beers on weekends. This place gets packed during big weeknight games and all day on weekends, with the booths and tables in the dining room usually reserved days in advance. He struck on 106th between Broadway and Amsterdam, a block from my building. The Upper West Side, or UWS as it is often abbreviated, is a large neighborhood or series of smaller adjacent neighborhoods in northern Manhattan, extending from 59 th Street northward to 110 th Street, with Central Park to the east and the Hudson River to the west. Neil Simon movie and yes a movie, but does show the charm and grit of the 70s. The reason I love my neighborhood is I can walk up my street and say hello to my neighbors. That said, it isnt a gimmicky spot where you pretend to be an early American settler. The area continues to be among the nations most integrated. a kosher restauran Josephs, thats just a few. I take issue with the notion that people tried to avoid living above 72nd street. At 254 West 54th Street, Steve Rubell and Ian Schrager converted a former opera house into the most notorious nightclub of the disco era. In 1998, that number had dropped to 2,000; last year, in 2009, only 987 felonies were committed there. I grew up New Yorkers and Their '80s Routines Block by Block As told to Kate Guadagnino , Elizabeth Gumport, Merrell Hambleton and Erin Sheehy April 17, 2018 The era might have been old New York's last. Via (Photo credit: Steven Siegel) Store signage at New York Times Square, around 1985. No one rememers Charevari, they had a couple of stores, Al buen gusto, Merit Farms, Columbia Savings bank, El Farro, Columbia Savings, the lending library and card shop that is now Giacommos, Gristedies, Bartons Candy Store, the movie theater on Bway between 72-73. And in part it was due to the difficulty the media had, even in the wake of the 1960s, reporting on the details of the crime (the New York Times, in every one of the fiveonly five!articles it published on the case, referred vaguely to sexual mutilation). Funny that someone else just posted. You want something obscure, because your horoscope recently told you to try new things. Also, bagels at H & H! Although the company liquidated in 1991, there are a handful of independently owned stores left around the United States. In the early '80s, Mimi Sheraton rhapsodized over the apps: " [The] possibilities are extraordinary, whether you choose the puffy, crisp-crusted Alsatian onion tart, the fine juniper-perfumed duck. I bet your cute daughter will look back at this decade as the magical Upper West Side, like you remember. Get a table or some bar seats at Dive Bar, a dimly-lit spot with over 30 beers on tap (most of which are available by the glass, growler, and pitcher). The hill going down to the park on West 91st. Even 50 years ago, its leftism was a lived-in leftism, a legacy leftism, dull and humorless and orthodox, inherited from parents and grandparents and already growing threadbare around the elbows like an old tweed jacket whose patches were themselves worn out from use. Social workers divided the block into three play sectors, with adults playing volleyball, teenagers playing inside at a youth center, and younger children the east end. Six months later, the Times declared that the problem had been managed: Worst Is Over on West 84th Street. The solution was depopulation and destruction: The Department of Real Estate reported that 709 families had moved or been relocated from buildings due to give way for new schools. Only then it was called slum clearance and urban renewal. I dont know what UWS Janet and Denton lived on, but it was dirty, dangerous and scary. Lets not forget about the orginal frozen cappuccinos on Columbus Avenue before Starbucks. When I go back (my mom still lives in her rent control spot on 72nd and WEA) I have a real cognitive dissonance. The Upper West Side of Manhattan is sandwiched in between Riverside Park to the west & Central Park to the east. That's right, another Infatuation review for yet another location of The Smith. My sister and I used to walk down the street and try to remember what was there before. People were afraid to ride the graffiti-streaked, crime soaked subways. I so miss living there and am trying to now come back from CT where I moved to be closer to Yale for medical purposes. In the late 1970s and early 1980s, Columbus Avenue in the 70's underwent an impressively upscale retail . West Side Story restaurant on 95th But on the Upper West Side of Manhattan, my small city, social pathologies began to run rampant half a century ago, long before they broke into the wider culture. The Arthouse Hotel is a bit of a hidden gem in the Upper West Side but not for long. .css-gdccrc{font-family:var(--chakra-fonts-condensed);font-weight:700;font-size:1rem;line-height:0.9;letter-spacing:0.08em;margin-top:var(--chakra-space-0);margin-left:var(--chakra-space-0);margin-right:var(--chakra-space-0);margin-bottom:var(--chakra-space-0);text-transform:uppercase;}@media screen and (min-width: 20rem){.css-gdccrc{line-height:0.9;}}@media screen and (min-width: 23.4375rem){.css-gdccrc{line-height:0.9;}}@media screen and (min-width: 37.5rem){.css-gdccrc{line-height:1;}}Bryan Kim & Matt Tervooren.css-1a7ccww{font-family:var(--chakra-fonts-body);font-weight:400;margin:var(--chakra-space-0);padding:var(--chakra-space-0);font-size:0.6875rem;letter-spacing:0.1em;line-height:1;text-transform:uppercase;}@media screen and (min-width: 37.5rem){.css-1a7ccww{font-size:0.75rem;letter-spacing:0.12em;}}October 4, 2018. An article on the front page of the New York Times on July 6, 1961, reported: Street fighting involving 400 Puerto Ricans and Negroes broke out in a West Side trouble block. Two women began arguing over a man, and a brawl erupted. I dont think the email in the article works. Raised on 104th. They also have jello shots, so your night here can either be very tame or full of colorful, gelatinous alcohol. Sometimes for the bathroom. One doesnt walk a block without seeing a yarmulke; the three conservative synagogues are alive and buzzing with congregants; the neighborhoods gans, day schools, and yeshivas are educating some 4,000 children; a dozen kosher restaurants and two kosher supermarkets profitably serve an increasingly observant community. We were giving up so much of our city, Myron Magnet has written in a beautiful essay on Saul Bellows great 1970 novel of Upper West Side (and Western civilizational) decline, Mr. Sammlers Planet, and how it spoke to his experience as a neighborhood resident. In the photo, the corner shop on 73rd was an upholstery shop, and aside from the (not so good) pizza shop, I cant remember any other store on that side of the street as being memorable. A) become playgrounds for East Village New Wavers. loved chariivari but those prices! It was 1990 on Manhattan's Upper East Side and, after the extravagant 1980s, the neighborhood . In order to reduce traffic congestion in . i graduated college in 1988 and came back to NYC, and i couldnt believe that my friends that went to work in investment banking all lived in a new building (the westmont) at 96th and columbus. I live on W 71 myself. Go to George Keeley. The Upper West Side ( UWS) is a neighborhood in the borough of Manhattan in New York City. Life is rough on everyone. I lived at 219 W 81st (corner of Broadway) from 1962 to 1967, when we moved to Queens because the neighborhood was becoming too dangerous! Apple Upper West Side Opens at 9:00 a.m. Shop by drop-in available Shop by appointment Reserve a shopping session Order pickup in store Learn more Genius Bar by appointment Make a reservation Today at Apple in store Find a session See all in-store and online services Address 1981 Broadway New York, NY 10023 (212) 209-3400 See map and directions Rescued Estates, before the "Crazy Landlord" rented the place to The Bean coffee shop. Every corner has a bank or a Duane Reade Pharmacy and almost all of the mom-and -pop businesses have been run out due to rent increases. #20. Lyford then dumped the refuse over his fence onto the concrete apron outside the offending tenements so that their superintendent could collect it, bag it, and leave it for the garbage men. The Upper West Side of my youth was in no way a fabled or especially notable area. Back in the days prostitues freely roamed Broadway, drug addicts shot up in our basement, wed look out our living room window And see prostitues making their deals. Local artists sold their wares and the kids tried not to kill themselves in the slightly deflated Moon Bounce. Terrible, just terrible. My friends lived in the 90s on Columbus and we used to skateboard and hang out all the time. Please enter your email address. Isnt the least bit fancy, but it also doesnt smell bad, and they even have some books you can read while you drink. I walked home alone from Lincoln Center many, many times and still do without being bothered. By 1990, there were 5,641 felonies. I am still amazed thinking how that now-pristine block was so different. People make the mistaken assumption that if you are new to a building and have children that means you are new to the UWS and probably a neo-con, yuppie, Wall Street-type, which isnt always the case. I love being able to walk to Central Park and be greeted by many people I have met over the years. This reminds me that the loan sharks and drug dealers never left the city, only they now dress in corporate suits and lobby for loopholes in D.C. instead of paying off morally corrupt citizens in dilapidated buildings. On the spot across the street from a friends building, I freeze with the sensation of having, right there, been jumped nearly 40 years earlier by four kids as I got off the city bus from school. You dont even need to go to municipal archives. Usually the small cities in America that never change are the ones whose best days came half a century or more ago and are now literally rotting away before your eyes, their once-handsome houses mottling, their fences akimbo, their storefronts boarded, their grass untended, their gas stations abandoned on windblown corners. The free outdoor summer concerts at Lincoln Center were wonderful. Prohibition is a 20sthemed bar with quality live music every night. .I could not get the police or the sanitation department to stop the airmail so I collected it. Some similarities within 1970s and 2015 and much change.Miss Most: John Lennon and Yoko Ono walks and talksMick JaggerMiles Davis..Bruce Willistending barJoan Allenhostess at Shelterbunch of artists, actors, musicians at The Only Child on West 79. St. James Gate is very much an Irish pub, but not in a cheesy kind of way. Probably the first high-end shop on Amsterdam Ave. Upper West Sider here. 12 Lost Gay Bars of New York City Michael Ryan. I remember when only the neighbors came out to see the Thanksgiving parade. Don't Miss A Drop. Kelly Ramos: Favorite wings in the entire city. But west end was great, and also 86th was great all the way over to the park. how times change! Others would doubtless claim that because the victims were black and Hispanic, there was less interest than there would have been had the victims been white; more likely, there was newsroom concern about stigmatizing thesebeaten-down povertystricken populations. The Cherry Restaurant on Columbus Ave. on the corner of 76th St., where the Chase Bank is now, was owned and staffed by Japanese people. There was a reason Verdi park was called Needle Park. Finding a place to grab a drink on the Upper West Side is not a difficult task, however, there are some bars worth visiting more than others especially if you're looking for a specific vibe or ambiance. Contentsshow 1The Mermaid Inn 2Prohibition 3The Owl's Tail 4Bodega 88 5E's Bar 6Vin Sur Vingt 7Dive Bar 8Jacob's Pickles I frankly dont recognize this overheated characterization of the 1970s-80s neighborhood. And The House of Games. Es Bar is one of our go-to spots in the neighborhood, because they do so many things right. My building is very family oriented. The business I miss? I also remember that the Upper West Side was a true neighborhood, and I remember the slow and then really fast gentrification of the neighborhood in the 70s, 80s, and 90s. Had a nice truffle festival as I recall. Zabars was open until midnight. . Abandoned West Side Highway, circa 1980. Miss all of the mom and pop shops. As first Columbus Avenue, then Broadway, and finally Amsterdam Avenue began to gentrify we were gratified to witness a steadily improving quality of life, but sidewalks teem[ing] with alcoholic homeless and residents knew to be inside their locked apartments by nightfall? Before wine bars, bank branches, and sushi restaurants took over the East Village, there were hole-in-the-wall clubs like 8BC, a gallery and performance space on Eighth Street between Avenues B and C. Opened in 1983, the place was over by the end of 1985. An indifferent French restaurant occupies the space that once housed the record store where I bought my first 45 rpm disc of the Cowsills singing the title song from Hair, and standing in front of it I split into two, the 49-year-old in the present and the seven-year-old in the past crossing its portal with a little brown paper bag in hand, excited beyond measure to get its contents home to place the needle on the 45s ridge and watch it slide into the first groove, the sound of the scratches giving way to the opening blast of the Cowsills five-part harmony. Its a good spot to day drink with a big group, but theres no table service - youll be notified by a buzzer when your order is ready at the counter. Restaurants. The whole thing about the terrible 1970s (and even 1980s) is vastly over-rated. 1. Theres a bar in the middle of the room, some banquette seating, and a few tables - plus floor-to-ceiling windows looking out on 72nd Street. That room and the first-come first-served bar area both have lots of TVs playing games at high volume, but what really sets Blondies apart from other sports bars is the food. There was Goldens stationery on Broadway, and Maharaja India with its beautiful exterior & mysteriously dark interior. I worked at Sweet Asylum in the early 80s and have tons of memories about the old neighborhood: everything from the charred remains of Santeria rituals on the big rock ACROSS from the 79th st. RSD playground to routinely getting mugged. She shares some memories below, and asks for some of yours. The character of this area has changed dramatically as it has become an influx of new luxury and converted-to-luxury Mitchell-Lama buildings, over-priced coffee franchises and domestic employees. I loved that they were open 24 hrs. You couldnt walk down my side street without seeing at least one car window smashed. If you are interested in answering a few questions email me at: jeannine.j@gmail.com. View Website Earn 3X Points. And there were a great deal of elderly poor people many of them the refugees who fled Europe after WW2 who wound up on the streets with shopping wagons filled with stuff after losing their apartments for whatever reasons that happened. My children, who are very young, will know, as my sisters and I did, the oddity of being both entirely privileged and yet significantly poorer than most of their classmates and friends. I raised two daughters here. Retroclubnyc is New York City and Manhattan's best club to celebrate a birthday party, bachelor party, bachelorette party, anniversary party, or engagement party! Food City was also where I dreamt of having my first jobs first as bagger, then aspiring to cashier. I do remember cake masters on 99 street, party cake on 110, teachers, the gold rail, the American restaurant on 85 & Broadway. Good luck with your project and I would be happy to talk if you like. I recall the Woolworth on 98th st, with its food counter and spinning stools, their comfy turquoise cushions and steel bases bolted to the checkered tile floor. Today the Upper West Side is cleaner with higher rents and upwardly mobile folk who seem to rent for a couple of years before buying big houses in Montclair or Maplewood. If you are a graduate student, you should know how to check municipal records for closing dates of stores. Pretty good ice cream place in the early 80s. RESERVE A TABLE. Eeyores bookstore, Woolworths, Greens, Morris Bros, Mancy pharmacy, Kandela pizzeria, Leroy pharmacy, The Library restaurant up our block, the movie theater on 89th and bway, Anchor savings bank, H & Hso many memories its crazy. That said, it isnt the sort of place where you have to whisper and swirl your glass before you take a drink. Broadway and West End. I have been thinking about this since it was originally posted a couple of years ago. MacAliers Pub was across the avenue. I called my dad from a pay phone and he said to go into the coffee shop on the corner in the hotel and dont move! the 90s were considered pretty scary back then, but the 70s and 80s were lovely. Awesome to read all the comments and Tnx to all my neighbors for taking time to reminisce West 72nd here from early 70s to 2012 Forgot so many places but this jogged a great deal to share nostalgically with my family I miss Eclaires, La Fortuna and laser rock of the early 80s and the many times I saw John and Yoko walking in the park as a kid .. Or the 72nd st Kung fu magazine store on the 2nd Memories are all we ever truly have. Use them in commercial designs under lifetime, perpetual & worldwide rights. One thing I have noticed of the UWS, which I find disturbing, is the influx of banks, financial storefront businesses and chain pharmacies on every street corner. My small city could have been one of those static, increasingly impoverished, blighted places. I am looking for long-time residents of the Upper West Side to answer some questions about how they think the neighborhood has changed and what they remember. Dreamstime is the world`s largest stock photography community. I think it and she was gone by 1975 or 76. I was mugged the one time I walked from Broadway and 80th to Columbus and 80th because I crossed Amsterdam Ave. and went east on the block. Not all of us move here for a few years. Outdoors at Noz Market. Prohibition is an upscale bar and lounge with some of the best bar food in the Upper West Side. We had so much fun we all agreed it's one of the best bars in the Upper West Side. Sounds like Jeannine should take that route. He didn't take studio photography or anything like that.". (Photo by Steven Siegel) Demolition began later that decade, which displaced the homeless who had by that point found shelter on the elevated roadway. Those were the days. This live HD webcam overlooks the cityscape and Coolsingel, a major street in the city centre of Rotterdam, South Holland, Netherlands, as shown on the map further down the page. Upper West Side march protest, circa 1980. But I had to wear my old prescriptions and couldnt see very well. This seasonal (May-October) outdoor bar has a bunch of umbrella-covered tables that might make you think youre in Madison Square Park, except for the fact that you can see the Hudson River and New Jersey. We also went on amazing trips with him, including the Rocky Horror Picture show on Broadway. 2) Endicott Book Store. By 1968, there were a whopping 85 bars on the Upper East Side, most of them singles bars. The UWS was terrible then. , a large number of snifters, and Maharaja India with its beautiful exterior & mysteriously dark.... Yet another bank down to the Ritzs deli between 71 and 70th on Avenue... 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