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“None of us knew the right thing to do in the circumstances.” For 19 months Ginger’s laid dormant, leaving Park Slope residents-and the entire New York City queer community-wondering if we’d lost another local business to the financial fallout of the pandemic. “We didn’t sell food so I didn’t see any point in trying to keep it going,” she says. Normally, Ginger’s is a go-to hub for Brooklyn’s nearest and queerest, but in the spring of 2020, just before its 20th anniversary celebration, Frayne reluctantly shuttered the bar’s storefront in response to the Covid pandemic. “When people walk in, we want them to know that the physical bar itself has been here for 125 years.”īut there was a moment when it all could have gone away. “It’s still a dive bar and we never want that to change,” says Donohoe. As is diversity and deeply planted queer roots-in the 1990’s, the space was home to a gay men’s bar named for the notorious prohibitionist, Carrie Nation. “It’s a place where my friends and I could be our authentic selves.” “It’s one of the few spaces where I’ve felt that I can exercise queer friendship,” Erica Rose, founder of “ The Lesbian Bar Project” campaign to support the endangered lesbian bar scene, told Lilith Magazine earlier this month.
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To its loyal patrons, Ginger’s is more than a bar. Soon, you can order from a new cocktail (and mocktail) menu, and there will also be a selection of Irish snacks, such as imported chocolates and “crisps.” “Everything is affordable,” points out Frayne’s business partner Brendan Donohoe. And for sober folks, there are plenty of nonalcoholic options. Enjoy a Dyke beer in a cozy window seat with your date, sip a spiked hot apple cider with friends around the digital jukebox, or enjoy an evening in the light-strung backyard (seasonally equipped with electric heaters) with Ginger’s’ hot toddy spinoff, featuring black tea, amaro, and rum. Featured beverages include beers from a rotation of micro-breweries, many of them female-owned and Brooklyn-based. The menu is dynamic and unpretentious, matching Ginger’s laid back, old school vibe. Need an excuse to wash your hand for the CDC-recommended 20 seconds? Gaze upon the display of vintage pin-up style photos just above the sinks. The restrooms are themselves museums of queer culture, their walls plastered with iconic imagery: magazine photos of Jane Lynch and the original cast of “The L Word,” newspaper clippings from Pride marches of decades past, and more.
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And in the back lives the ancient pool table, plus a brand-new mobile stage. Two large flags, pride and Irish, preside over the main room. With more than 20 years of business under its belt, it is a reflection of Brooklyn’s vibrant queer history with an Irish twist, and more specifically, the lesbian roots of the neighborhood once known as “Dyke Slope.”īelow a bright orange-you could call it ginger-ceiling, there’s something for everyone: the athlete (a shelf of sports trophies), the activist (protest posters), the artist (queer masterpieces), the elder (historical queer memorabilia). Located on Park Slope’s Fifth Avenue, Ginger’s Bar, owned by Sheila Frayne, is a local institution. “I used to love ‘The L Word’ watch parties on Sundays-it always got crazy.” While one lines up a shot, her companion reminisces over time spent in the bar over the years. It’s a rainy Sunday evening at Brooklyn’s only lesbian bar and two local women are kicking off a round of pool.