The Blue Grotto Coffeehouse Los Angeles

Subject: RE: The Blue Grotto Coffeehouse Los Angeles
From: GUEST
Date: 23 Mar 21 - 10:44 AM

Dear Preacher,
don't be sad! i am a beautiful human being! life is beautiful!
i suspect john passed away but would still love to speak to you.
candy fickle was my mom. wendy fickle my aunt.
8058613650 please call me.
much love and peace,
amy

Subject: RE: The Blue I Grotto Coffeehouse Los Angeles
From: GUEST,Lin
Date: 23 Mar 21 - 08:32 PM

Does anyone remember a guy named, Gary Adams that was always there?

I think he was about 20 or 21 years old and had blondish brown curly wavy hair. Not really hippy looking. Just medium length hair and clean cut, nice looking guy.

Subject: RE: The Blue Grotto Coffeehouse Los Angeles
From: GUEST,April
Date: 28 Aug 21 - 03:46 PM

What a nice surprise to find this posting. I used to go to The Blue Grotto when I was 16-17. Foster asked me to paint a new sign for the coffeehouse on Fairfax. Wish I had a picture of the artwork I made. I'm guessing he paid me $25 or $30. I don't know if he used it at the 2nd location.

Subject: RE: The Blue Grotto Coffeehouse Los Angeles
From: GUEST,Linda
Date: 29 Aug 21 - 09:46 AM

Hi April,
We probably ran into each other there. I was the same age as you. Do you remember a guy named Marty Owens that had the "Dylan look" and Marty played guitar. If he wasn't playing his guitar he was playing pool in the back room. If he wasn't doing that he was talking to me.?? He was also about 16 or 17 years old and had a motorcycle.

Subject: RE: The Blue Grotto Coffeehouse Los Angeles
From: GUEST
Date: 30 Aug 21 - 07:52 PM

Hi Linda. Sorry, no. I do remember an amiable guy named Jinx and a black guy we called "Snowball" who rode a motorcycle. I used to go there with a blond girl named Laura and sometimes another girl named Lyn. Jinx also hung out on the Strip (which we all did); 5th Estate, Ben Franks, etc.

Subject: RE: The Blue Grotto Coffeehouse Los Angeles
From: GUEST,Linda
Date: 31 Aug 21 - 09:21 PM

To Guest:
I don't know remember any of the people you mentioned but we probably were there at the same time. I used to go there with a girl named Pam. She was tall and had blond hair and I am petite and had long thick wavy auburn hair.

Subject: RE: The Blue Grotto Coffeehouse Los Angeles
From: GUEST,Huckleberry forque
Date: 20 Oct 21 - 10:46 PM

I went in the grotto at 16 and loved the place. I remember Jimmy the guy looking looked like Chicago and had a very good grip I never saw any body pull away from him. Saw either Jonny or edgar winters just playing blues. I can still play it.

Subject: RE: The Blue Grotto Coffeehouse Los Angeles
From: GUEST,Lin
Date: 21 Oct 21 - 11:16 PM

We were both the same age when I was hanging out at the Blue Grotto. Wonder if we ever met? I am very petite and had long thick wavy auburn hair. Did you know a Marty Owens? He was my good friend.
He always had his Martin guitar with him. He used to play it in the back room where the pool table was. If he wasn't playing his guitar, he was playing pool.

He kind of looked like Bob Dylan, thin, with curly brown hair. Also about 16 or 17 years old.
Or maybe you knew my friend, Pam or Beverly. We were all 16 years old.
We loved the Blue Grotto!!!

Subject: RE: The Blue Grotto Coffeehouse Los Angeles
From: GUEST
Date: 18 Feb 22 - 10:51 PM

Did Marty have a sister named Arlene?

Subject: RE: The Blue Grotto Coffeehouse Los Angeles
From: GUEST,.gargoyle
Date: 21 Feb 22 - 08:22 PM

The "E-Bar"
(Espresso Bar)?
was near the Grotto, it was entered from a long, narrow, poorly lit back alley.

It was an industrial size room, with no dividers.

It was popular on Oscar, Golden Globe nights...the limos pulled up and the "celebs" walked (very safe) streets with a feeling of danger.

Sincerely,
GARGOYLE

Subject: RE: The Blue Grotto Coffeehouse Los Angeles
From: GUEST,Lin
Date: 22 Feb 22 - 04:39 PM

To Guest (Post from 18, February 2022.
Marty had a sister by the name of Janet Owens, not Arlene.

Subject: RE: The Blue Grotto Coffeehouse Los Angeles
From: GUEST,Myron Rosenberg
Date: 07 Jul 22 - 12:52 PM

In 1964-65, while I was a senior at Valley State, I would often go to a Blue Grotto Cafe, but it was up in the hills, I believe high up on Laurel Canyon. They charged like a buck to get in, only had coffee, and there was live entertainment. I think it was, like, behind someone's house. It was a 'happening' place, REAL COOL, people would wear shades... it was particularly mellow. I went from 'this' mellowness, to reporting for active duty as a Marine Corps officer...two weeks before 'The Bay of Tonkin'. Does anyone remember THAT place. I'm an Alaska photographer... [phone]
Myron Rosenberg

Subject: RE: The Blue Grotto Coffeehouse Los Angeles
From: GUEST
Date: 26 Nov 23 - 01:54 AM

Do you remember Doormouse?Buddy?

Subject: RE: The Blue Grotto Coffeehouse Los Angeles
From: GUEST,.gargoyle
Date: 28 Nov 23 - 11:32 AM

In reply to 20th of March, 17 posting.

Griffith Park photo - captures the spirit.

https://4.bp.blogspot.com/-JDVqOTXCo8E/V2xnSmq7XuI/AAAAAAAAk5Y/oK3Uf0spnqUUQKCxS1VeBxgR1BMn5jVfwCK4B/s1600/1967.jpg


Sincerely,
Gargoyle

We had joy, we had fun, we had seasons in the sun ...

Subject: RE: The Blue Grotto Coffeehouse Los Angeles
From: GUEST,KC
Date: 15 Jan 24 - 05:06 PM

I remember the Blue Grotto on Fairfax with fond memories. I helped Foster behind the counter with drinks and the occasional burger he would cook up. Foster, Cathy, Jinx, I and some others went down to the beach one day and he gave me some acid (it was my first time). It was a fabulous day, and everyone had fun lol! Wish I had some pictures of the old place, but unfortunately, I don't.

Subject: RE: The Blue Grotto Coffeehouse Los Angeles
From: GUEST,Bin there
Date: 10 Apr 24 - 04:45 AM

First it was to Hullabaloo on Sunset, then on down to Canters or not, ending up at the Blue Grotto. Blue Grotto? Only can recall a room, not too big, where we sat until the police rousted us. No arrests, nobody holding.

Another place up on Cahuenga called the Omnibus. A lot more people. More opportunities to meet new friends. I met a young woman there. She drove me home, asked me to go to SF with her. Told her I'd have to ask my parents. How old are you, she queried? "15," I replied.

Blue Grotto still seems a bit mysterious as in "What is this place?" I don't recall seeing anyone or anything else there, aside from my friends and the chairs we sat in. Fairfax, what a place!

Subject: RE: The Blue Grotto Coffeehouse Los Angeles
From: GUEST,Linda 2
Date: 13 Jul 24 - 06:07 PM

I remember the Blue Grotto! I was there only once. It was 1965 or 66, and I lived in the Los Feliz area but attended Fairfax summer school because Hollywood didn't offer it that year, and one day I just meandered into the Blue Grotto after school, early afternoon, and it was just as Linda (above) described. I loved that dark atmosphere -- so exotic to me. There were not many people there that early, but the handful there were friendly and laid back. Outside I met some kids and one of them offered me a "benny." It was an actual benny wrapped in foil like a Rolaids tablet, and wow-eeeee! I usually took the 89 bus home, but that day I walked all the way home to Los Feliz and then painted my bedrooms windows with poster paints to look like that imitation stained-glass contact paper, and when everyone else in the house was asleep, I stayed up all night with the phone chord stretched to my bedroom closet,talking between songs to a midnight-to-six a.m. deejay at KFWB, and by morning I was still perky. I always meant to go back to the Blue Grotto, but summer school ended and kids were gathering on the strip from where I also meandered up to Laurel Canyon and made a few friends up there, and by the summer of '68, I moved up there with a doorman & dishwasher at The Troubadour, and the rest is, as they say, history. But the Blue Grotto was one of those chance encounters you made in the '60s and never forget.
Thanks for the memories.

Subject: RE: The Blue Grotto Coffeehouse Los Angeles
From: GUEST,Linda
Date: 16 Jul 24 - 11:15 AM

Hi Linda 2,
Nice to read your post. I am the one with the first post about the Blue Grotto. So many memories, almost like it was yesterday. I even remember when I drew on the wall inside the restroom. It was a drawing of a guy with curly brown hair because I was in love with folk singer Donovan and also a guy named Marty that I met at the Blue Grotto,who was a folk singer with curly brown hair. I loved the Blue Grotto and went there all the time in 1967, 1968. I was a young teenage girl, in high school,and took the bus on Beverly Blvd and second bus on Fairfax to get there. I met my friend Beverly or Pam there and it was so much fun! Do you remember a place on Fairfax near Beverly Blvd called The Infinite Mind? I useed to go there too.