By Bruce Klauber
Mike Gill is the brand manager of WENJ-FM radio in South Jersey. He’s one of the many who remember Maloney’s in Margate.
“We all have our favorite place to go and watch the game and grab a drink,” Gill wrote last year on the radio station’s homepage. “We asked people from all over South Jersey what bar they missed the most, and the one answer that appeared in every city we asked was Maloney’s in Margate.
“Maloney’s closed for good in 2005, but it has never been forgotten. The bar was located on 21 S. Washington Ave. in Margate and two dining rooms and five bars, including an outdoor patio.
“The place had familiar and friendly bartenders and a tiny little bathroom. There was an old cigarette machine and an ultra low ceiling that had beer labels stuck to it, and patrons would need to navigate their way through the tavern area, or ‘zoo’ as it was often called (which was also my favorite part of hanging out at Maloney’s).
“Plenty of local relationships, friendships and more were formed at Maloney’s, and its unique atmosphere is something the locals and people who vacation in Margate still miss to this day. It was torn down to make way for luxury townhouses.
“Judging by the amount of people who answered ‘Maloney’s’ when we asked what South Jersey bar was missed the most, it’s clearly a place that is very memorable.”
Call it Margate’s answer to Cheers, if you will, but those who remember and frequented Maloney’s through the years will tell you that it was much more than a neighborhood watering hole where shore visitors gathered each summer. They’ll tell you that it was unique and there will never be another place like it.
History suggests that there has been a bar at 21 S. Washington Ave. since the turn of the 20th century, although it didn’t become Maloney’s until around 1956, when a whiskey salesman named Jack Maloney bought the place. George Naame, who ran the Elbow Room (which later became Jerry Blavat’s Memories) bought the bar in 1970.
He kept the name, explaining to veteran Philadelphia Daily News columnist and author Don Russell, aka Joe Sixpack, “I thought Maloney’s sounded a lot better than Naame’s, especially for an Irish bar.”
In the years that Naame owned it, Maloney’s expanded to two dining rooms, five bars and an outdoor patio. The entertainment, in addition to the DJs, was pure rock ‘n’ roll, with famed cover bands like Cook E. Jarr and The Krums, and the great Soul Survivors. Russell was a frequent visitor to Maloney’s through the years and wrote vividly about the scene there.
“It was a classic shore bar,” Russell wrote. “It was a boozy, jam-packed joint where you cooled off with Solarcaine and Budweiser, where the shoobies danced, the DJs cranked up the noise and you met your summer love.
“You recognized half the crowd from your neighborhood back home. You might even have spotted a local celeb. Ex-crime boss Joey Merlino used to hang out there, and even got himself arrested once for leaving the bar with an open beer.”
Naame took Russell on a guided tour of the spot back in the day, and pointed out that the bar’s furnishings were as special as everything else within Maloney’s. “We built that cooler over here. It holds 700 cases of beer,” Naame told Russell.
“The glass ceiling in the dining room was pulled from the Mexican Pavilion at the 1964 World’s Fair in New York. The shelves are from the pharmacy at Atlantic City’s Haddon Hall. The bar trim was pulled from the old Longport Inn. The dome lights upstairs are from The Breakers Hotel, the solid oak tables are from the Vienna Restaurant on the Boardwalk. I bought ’em for $23 apiece.”
Maloney’s was not just about beer and rock ‘n’ roll. The place had a heart.
Naame instituted the Maloney’s Bike-A-Thon to raise money for area charities. Every September, cyclists who signed up stopped at every bar between Margate and Wildwood. For 29 years, those bikers went through a lot of beer and raised more than $2 million for charity. By 2004, Naame said things just weren’t the same and he could see the handwriting on the wall.
“Margate’s old three-bedroom houses, the ones that held a dozen jam-packed roomies, have been ripped down and replaced with sparse, million-dollar mansions,” Russell wrote. “Their wealthy occupants, many of whom visit the island only a couple of times each year, aren’t the types to belly up in a smoky bar.”
In a way, Maloney’s lives on, at least digitally. The I Miss Maloney’s Tavern Facebook Group, “For those of us who still can’t stomach the demise of Maloney’s in Margate,” as the homepage states, boasts an astounding 3.3 million members.
One of those who posted on the Maloney’s page posed the question, “I wonder how many people at Maloney’s and were later married to each other.”
There were dozens of comments. Here’s a sampling:
“My parents… they married in 1965! My dad used to play piano in there for beer money!”
“Me! I met my husband May 26, 1991 and will be married 30 years in October.”
“We met there September 1980. He was a bouncer. Been married 41 years now with two grown sons. My sister met her husband there, too.”
“I met my husband at Maloney’s in 1975. We got married in September, 1978. We’re still happily together 46 years later and we get together with my husband’s friends who all met their wives at Maloney’s a few times a year… They were fun times!”
“My first date was at Maloney’s and we will be married 30 years next week!”
In my guise as a musician, I’ve probably worked at hundreds of bars, taverns, tap rooms and restaurants over the years. None of them were like this.
Maybe that’s because none of them were Maloney’s.
Bruce Klauber is the author of four books, an award-winning music journalist, concert and record producer and publicist, producer of the Warner Brothers and Hudson Music “Jazz Legends” film series, and performs both as a drummer and vocalist.
