Rummaging through some old slides, I came across two photographs I took in Greenwich Village, in 1963. Both phoyographs were taken on McDougal St. The corner of McDougal and Bleeker streets was considered the center of Greenwich Village and these pictures were taken in front of the Kettle Of Fish tavern, the Gaslight Cafe and Izzy Young's Folklore Center.

The Gaslight Cafe was my favorite place to go to listen to, and play music. Monday night's, Dave Van Ronk ran a hootenanny there and if you wanted to gain favor with him, you'd do a few songs so that he could go upstairs to the Kettle Of Fish to have a couple of beers. I sang there just about every Monday night, and even ran the hootenanny once for Dave.

You could see or hear just about everyone at the Gslight Cafe. Among the people I heard there were Bob Dylan, Arlo Guthrie (when he was about 16), Jack Elliot, Mississippi John Hurt, Tom Paxton, Dave Van Ronk when he wasn't running the hootenanny, Noel Stookey as a comic(Paul of Peter, Paul and Mary), Len Chandler, Lou Gossett, Bill Cosby, Wavy Gravy, Jim Kweskin, Johnny Cash, Peter LaFarge, Peter Stampfel, Peter Tork (later of the Monkees)David Cohen (who later changed his name to D.David Cuffe, and finally to David Blue) and many more that will come to mind as soon as I post this. I saw Cisco Houston there, just before he died... he couldn't sing any more, but came in to hear the music. And one night, I opened for The Highwaymen, who had a current hit with Michael, Row The Boat Ashore.

Across the street was the Fat Black Pussy Cat where I shared the stage one evening with Richie Havens and Tiny Tim.

Jeff has posted the two photos on my photo page, along with a photograph of the Gospel Messengers for the curious of mind.

Good memories from just two photographs..

Jerry