The
Rainbow
History Project
Preserving
Our Community's Memories
The
ClubHouse
May 10,
1975 - May 27, 1990
Can You Feel It?
It
was the ultimate house party, the “party in your house you never had.”
1296 Upshur
St. NW
all
photos and images (c) Clubhouse Enterprises
On the Saturday of Mothers Day weekend 1975, Aundrea and Paulette Scott, John Eddy, Chasten Morell, and Rainey Cheeks opened DC’s newest dance club and community institution: The ClubHouse. It was a success before it even opened. People had been lining up for memberships for months. At its peak, the ClubHouse had more than 4,000 members. For fifteen years, nights at the ClubHouse provided the central focus of African-American gay DC social life.Uniquely for a dance club, it was a non-profit corporation. The owners dedicated their club to creating something new and special for the community and to providing a space not just for good times but for community organizations and events. John Eddy remarked to The Hilltop that "The concept of The ClubHouse is a good old-fashioned house party atmosphere where people can be themselves and enjoy the latest music in unpretentious surroundings."
Clubhouse Slogans Dance Your Ass Off You Know If You Belong Specializing in Positive Energy Through Music Located across from a school in an upper northwest residential neighborhood, the new venue had a public hall license and was organized as a membership club: no one got in without a membership or sponsorship by a member. Sponsored guests had to have their names listed before arrival at the club. Under its public hall license, The ClubHouse had to apply for Class D licenses for each event at which the managers wanted to serve alcohol; the club's famous punch helped fuel many an evening.
The organizers incorporated in July 1974 as ClubHouse Enterprises and spent the following ten months preparing for the opening. Eddy, on one of his many motorcycles rides around the city, identified the site, a divided building with entrances at 1292 and 1296 Upshur St. With a loan in hand, organizers replaced the wall dividing the building with a connecting hallway, installed state-of-the-art sound systems and lights, and began interviewing potential members.
MEMBERSHIPS Membership interviews began in February 1975. Demand for memberships was heavy and by opening night, the club had a core membership of 400. The club concept was based in part on practices at New York City’s Loft club. However, at The ClubHouse memberships were free. Potential members had to be accepted by the managers, agreed to be responsible for their own behavior and that of their guests, and accepted restrictions on behavior at the club. ClubHouse memberships became so valuable over the next decade and a half that few people were willing to chance losing a membership. For those without a membership, knowing a member was the key to a night at The ClubHouse.
Memberships were specific to a night. Friday night memberships were for predominately straight evenings entitled ZEI: the Saturday night memberships for Vibrations were for predominately gay and lesbian members.
ClubHouse members remember the scene at 1296 Upshur St. NW
THE SCENE For a generation of Washingtonians, a night at The ClubHouse was the capstone of a night out. Local oral histories recall starting an evening at Nob Hill, The Brass Rail, La Zambra or the Bachelor’s Mill, and finishing up at The ClubHouse, where the party often lasted until dawn – or later. Most members arrived in the early morning, around 2 am. Balloons filled the 10,000 square feet of dance hall and ‘aging’ balloons were hauled up to the ceiling for climactic balloon drops. On more than one occasion the party lasted while snowstorms and blizzards raged outside.The ClubHouse took the art of partying seriously, working up a unique mix of music, lights and atmosphere that created hot hard nightlong dance parties. The staff prided themselves on creating “the party you never had in your house.” Aundrea Scott, who became the club's general manager, took responsibility for sounds and light, as well as training in the club’s DJs and staff to the owners’ high standards.
ClubHouse Enterprises: Officers
President John Eddy Vice President Morrell Chasten Treasurer/General Manager Aundrea Scott Board Secretary/Manager Paulette Scott ClubHouse Manager/Security Rainey Cheeks
EVOLUTION The ClubHouse grew out of a series of popular dance clubs in DC based originally on the popular house parties of the Metropolitan Capitalites, an early African American social club. When parties at 4011 14th St. NW outgrew the house, John Eddy located basement space beneath a biker bar at 221 Riggs Rd NE which became the Zodiac Den. Opening in 1969, The Zodiac provided a much needed dance space for gay African Americans at the end of the 60s and beginning of the 70s. Eddy, Chasten, Aundrea and Paulette Scott were part of the team organizing the Zodiac.
When the upstairs space became available, the Zodiac Den took over the entire building and created a new club, The Third World, in 1972. Just Us, the 1975 guide to gay DC, noted:
“With food, drinks, quadraphonic disco dancing, and regular live entertainment, the Third World has one of the most varied programs of any gay bar in the DC area. Their Sunday entertainers in-clude jazz, blues, rock and gospel singers. There is a one dollar cover charge on Thursdays and Sundays for disco dancing, three dollars on Fridays and Saturdays. It is predominantly a black bar attracting both sexes from age 21 to mid 50’s. Reservations are suggested for Sundays.”While Eddy, Chasten, and the Scotts (also owners of The Third World) developed The Clubhouse, they kept the earlier club going until, in 1976, operations at The ClubHouse necessitated the closing of The Third World.The ClubHouse commemorated its ancestors, its club lineage, in ads that traced the evolution from the Metropolitan Capitalites to the ClubHouse.
Always a top club in Washington, DC, The ClubHouse soon attracted a national following. African American gays came to town and spent evenings at the club. Memberships took on a national, even international, aspect. John Eddy estimates that 7 to 10% of members were non-African Americans.
NAMES AND LOGOS
The club's name has gone through various spelling usages. Initially, the "h" was capitalized along with the "c" in "clubhouse" when the name didn't appear in all capitals. Overtime, it has also appeared with a lower case "h" and as two words "club" and "house".Logos have also evolved from the first one which featured a donkey under the arch of the logo (in keeping with the slogan "dance your ass off") to an art nouveau design resting on a flat line, to finally the art nouveau design with a pendant underhang.
