A plaque remaining from the Big Apple Night Club at West 135th Street and Seventh Avenue in Harlem.

Above, a 1934 plaque from the Big Apple Night Club at West 135th Street and Seventh Avenue in Harlem. Discarded as trash in 2006. Now a Popeyes fast food restaurant on Google Maps.

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Entry from April 30, 2009
Ladies’ Night

Entry in progress—B.P.
 
Wikipedia: Ladies’ night
A ladies’ night (sometimes ladies night) is a promotional event, often at a bar or nightclub, where female patrons get a reduced price for admission or goods.
 
Ladies’ nights in the United States have been successfully challenged in lawsuits by men who were discriminated against by these events, and are illegal in some jurisdictions: in California they were ruled illegal under the Unruh Civil Rights Act, in Koire v Metro Car Wash, 40 Cal 3d24, 219 Cal Rptr 133 (1985).
 
In the early 1990s, Bud Light ran a series of ads in which several men dressed unconvincingly as women in an attempt to avoid the requirement to pay the establishment for the beer they consumed.
 
Ladies’ night also may refer to a particular day of the week at a golf course or country club where only women are allowed to sign up for the event and allowed on the course.
 
In Singapore, there has been cases where females are not admitted under this scheme as they have been deemed as butches.
 
In the United Kingdom a ladies’ night will often feature a male stripper or several.
 
Wikipedia: Ladies’ Night (song)
“Ladies’ Night” was the hit title track single on the album Ladies’ Night released in 1979 by Kool and the Gang. The song as a single was a success, and became a radio staple. It was also a chart success, peaking at #8 on the Billboard Hot 100 in 1980.

A short rendition of the song appeared in the 1997 film The Wedding Singer in which Jon Lovitz performed in an attempt to convince female lead Julia Sullivan (Drew Barrymore) to hire him for her wedding.
 
(Oxford English Dictionary)
ladies’ night n. a function at an all-male club or organization to which women are invited; (in later use also) an evening on which women are given free or reduced admission to a nightclub or similar venue.
a1828 J. BERNARD Retrospections of Stage (1832) II. ii. 28 We had not only the men but the women petitioning for admission as visitors. This induced the Committee to give what was termed ‘A *Ladies’ Night’.
1889 G. B. SHAW London Music 1888-89 (1937) 266 An invitation from the Grosvenor Club to their ‘ladies’ night’ at the Grosvenor Gallery.
1970 K. GILES Death in Church i. 18 The atmosphere of a Masonic ladies’ night.
1980 Associated Press Newswire (Nexis) 12 July, The ladies’ nights, on which women do not have to pay cover charges and can buy drinks at reduced prices, are unfair to male patrons.
2003 C. WHITEHEAD Colossus of N.Y. 125 Happy hour descends… It’s ladies’ night or discounted jello shots or two for one.
 
28 January 1924, New York (NY) Times, “Composer Tells of Sidewalks Song,” pg. 7:
“Well, I had been having a good time at Charley Murphy’s Anawanda Club in Second Avenue, as it was ladies’ night, and I had everything to drink from champagne to beer. This was in August, 1894.”
(Charles B. Lawlor, composer of the song “The Sidewalks of New York”—ed.)
 
15 November 1981, New York (NY) Times, “Bars Get Warning on ‘Ladies’ Nights’” by Ellen Mitchell, pg. LI6:
“LADIES’ NIGHT” at the local pub has fallen victim to equal rights. Unless the neighborhood tavern offers a like number of “Gentlemen’s Nights,” special promotions only for women are illegal.
 
Actually, it has been a violation of the New York State Human Rights Law since 1972 to discriminate against men by soliciting female patrons through such advertising as “Ladies’ drinks—50 cents” or “Unescorted girls half price.” Only recently, however, have restaurants and tavern proprietors begun to pay much heed to the law—and many say they will continue to ignore it.

Posted by Barry Popik
New York CityFood/Drink • Thursday, April 30, 2009 • Permalink


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