The Hottest Joint:The Cotton Club

By: Victoria Craft Per.3

In the 1920, heavyweight boxer Jack Johnson opened a club by the name of Club De Luxe in the Harlem neighborhood of New York City. The Club was home to many great African American entertainers and it operated during the prohibition era which prohibited alcohol. The club was bought and taken over by a gangster named Owney Madden in 1923 and he changed the named to The Cotton Club.
The Club often portrayed the racist image of the 1920s with a “white only” policy which attracted more whites to the establishment. The girls of the club, the chorus girls, had to be light skinned, young and tan in order to work.
The Cotton Club was the center of the nightclub scene, where wealthy clientele met w/ celebrities and gangsters of Harlem. The club had closed temporarily in 1936 after the race riot in Harlem in 1935. The club closed for good in 1940 and reopened in 1978 w/ Cab Calloway and his band and many other great performers of that time.
Now the club’s new owner has a new policy which allows former excluded clientele to patron the club. Till this day The Cotton Club of New York City is the most famous nightclub in history presenting great entertainment during a time of prohibition and illegal activity.