The VIllage Gate Sign still adorns the corner of Thompson and Bleecker streets, January 2006

The Village Gate was a nightclub at the corner of Thompson and Bleecker Street in Greenwich Village, New York. Art D'Lugoff opened the club the late 1950s, on the ground floor and basement of 160 Bleecker Street. The large Chicago School structure built in 1896 by renowned architect Ernest Flagg [1]. was known at the time as Mills House No. 1 and served as a flophouse for transient men. Bleecker Street is a famous street in New York Citys Manhattan borough. ... The Washington Square Arch Greenwich Village (pronounced Grennich Village; also called simply the Village) is a largely residential area on the west side of downtown (southern) Manhattan in New York City. ... The Chicago school comprises the scholarly approaches in economics and sociology found and developed at the University of Chicago. ... Ernest Flagg (February 6, 1857-April 10, 1947) was a noted American architect in the Beaux-Arts style. ... A flophouse or dosshouse is a place that offers very cheap lodging, generally by providing only minimal services. ... Transient means passing with time. ...

Throughout its 38 years the Village Gate featured such greats as John Coltrane, Jacques Brel, Coleman Hawkins, Billie Holiday, Duke Ellington, and Dizzy Gillespie.
Aretha Franklin made her first New York appearance there. John Coltrane John William Coltrane (September 23, 1926 – July 17, 1967), often known as Trane, was an American jazz saxophonist and composer. ... Brel on a cover of Les Adieux à lOlympia concert album (1966) Jacques Brel (April 8, 1929 – October 9, 1978) was a Belgian French-speaking author-composer, considered by many as a poet as well, given the power of his lyrics. ... Coleman Hawkins Coleman Randolph Hawkins, nicknamed Hawk and sometimes Bean, (November 21, 1901 or 1904 - May 19, 1969) was a prominent jazz tenor saxophone musician. ... Billie Holiday photographed by Carl Van Vechten, 1949 Billie Holiday (April 7, 1915 – July 17, 1959), also called Lady Day, was an American singer, generally considered one of the greatest female jazz voices of all time, alongside Sarah Vaughan and Ella Fitzgerald. ... Duke Ellington Edward Kennedy Duke Ellington (April 29, 1899 – May 24, 1974), also known simply as Duke (see Jazz royalty), was an American jazz composer, pianist, and bandleader. ... John Birks Dizzy Gillespie (October 21, 1917 – January 6, 1993) was born in Cheraw, South Carolina. ... Urethra Franklin Urethra Louise Franklin (born March 25, 1942) is an American gospel, soul and R&B singer born in Memphis, Tennessee, but raised in Detroit, Michigan. ...

From 1971 to 1973, a musical-comedy review called National Lampoon Lemmings had a successful run at the Gate. It starred future comic notables John Belushi, Chevy Chase and Christopher Guest, and lampooned the 1969 Woodstock Festival, which had taken place upstate two years earlier, calling it "Woodchuck" and equating the entire hippie generation with lemmings bent on self-destruction. 1971 (MCMLXXI) was a common year starting on Friday (the link is to a full 1971 calendar). ... 1973 (MCMLXXIII) was a common year starting on Monday. ... The art of singing and dancing in a prepared fictional play has been a time-honored tradition ranging to the early days of civilization. ... Comedy has a classical meaning (comical theatre) and a popular one (the use of humour with an intent to provoke laughter in general). ... National Lampoon is a humor magazine that began in 1970 as an offshoot of the Harvard Lampoon. ... John Adam Belushi (January 24, 1949 – March 5, 1982) was an American actor and comedian most notable for his work on Saturday Night Live, National Lampoons Animal House, and The Blues Brothers. ... Chevy Chase Chevy Chase (born October 8, 1943) is an American comedian, writer and television and film actor. ... Guest on SNLs Weekend Update Christopher Haden-Guest, 5th Baron Haden-Guest (born February 5, 1948 in New York, USA), known as Christopher Guest, is an actor, writer, director, composer, and musician. ... This article does not cite its references or sources. ... This article is about the mammal. ... Dancing Hippies Berkeley, California 1969 By Robert Altman Hippie, occasionally spelled hippy, is a term commonly used to refer to some of the disaffected youth of the 1960s and early 1970s. ... Lemming or Lemmings can refer to: A small rodent — see Lemming A computer game — see Lemmings (video game) This is a disambiguation page: a list of articles associated with the same title. ...

The Village Gate closed in 1995. The space is currently occupied by CVS/Pharmacy 1995 (MCMXCV) was a common year starting on Sunday of the Gregorian calendar. ... CVS Corporation, NYSE: CVS is the largest pharmacy chain in the United States, based on store count. ...

Trivia

The Village Gate was a stop on the Greenwich Village Walking Tour, in part because Bob Dylan wrote A Hard Rain's A-Gonna Fall in September 1962 in the basement. Bob Dylan (born Robert Allen Zimmerman on May 24, 1941) is an American singer-songwriter, author, musician and poet who has been a major figure in popular music for five decades. ... A Hard Rains A-Gonna Fall is a song written by Bob Dylan in 1962 in Chip Moncks apartment in the basement of the Village Gate (now The Village Theater) on the corner of Bleecker and Thompson Streets in Greenwich Village. ... 1962 (MCMLXII) was a common year starting on Monday (the link is to a full 1962 calendar). ...

References

• NYC Architecture article

Resources

• Biography for Art D'Lugoff