A New York City bar that even Covid could not shutter
Peter McManus Cafe, one of the city’s oldest, kept its doors open as the pandemic descended with a vengeance. Then, it met an even more formidable foe: the New York City real estate market.
Hi! Welcome to this week’s special edition of Permission Slips, featuring the completed story I submitted as my thesis in spring 2022 before I finished grad school, mentioned in last week’s post. We’ll return to regularly-scheduled programming next week.
One of my favorite things about the UK is pub culture. Knowing there’s a cozy place nearby where I can sit among other humans makes life here less gloomy. As my time abroad winds to a close, I’ve started thinking about how I can work to establish more “third places” for myself back home. Considered a “home away from home,” a third place is a social space separate from home and work where people can unwind and connect with others. In the wake of the pandemic, countless beloved neighborhood cafes, bars and restaurants have closed, leaving holes in many lives. Life can feel quite lonely without a third space.
So for any New Yorkers seeking a third space full of warmth, history and tradition, make like the Roy siblings in Season four, episode 2 of HBO’s Succession and look no further than the subject of this story, the third space that occupies the street corner across from my old apartment: Peter McManus Cafe.
Huge thanks to the entire McManus family, blood and chosen, for spending so much time with me as I reported this story out, and to Ari Goldman, the esteemed journalist I’m grateful to have called my thesis advisor, for his support and encouragement to get this thing published, even a year later.
And, thanks to you, dear reader, for spending some of your precious free time on reading this story.
Editor’s Note: This story was written in May 2022, with minor updates made in summer 2022 and winter 2023.
Beer sloshed across the wooden bar top as a patron sheepishly apologized to no one in particular, righting the glass bottle it spilled from. It was St. Patrick’s Day 2022 in New York City, exactly two years after indoor drinking and dining were first suspended in response to the coronavirus pandemic, and New Yorkers were making up for lost time. The 45-foot bar in Peter McManus Cafe was once again supporting the elbows of dozens of people from all walks of life — cops and comedians; bagpipe players and blue-collar workers; doctors and dealers; millionaires and mailmen— mismatched but somehow meshing seamlessly together, like the different types of wood the bar was built from 87 years ago.
Before the beer puddle could turn sticky, a stained white towel materialized to sop up the mess. The hand that expertly swiped the liquid away belonged to none other than Justin McManus, who has been well-acquainted with the bar’s worn wooden surface since he was a small boy unable to see over it. “I was pouring beers when I was five years old,” Justin said. Now 40, Justin is the fourth-generation owner and manager of Peter McManus Cafe, believed to be the oldest family-owned and operated bar and restaurant in New York City.
The St. Patrick’s Day bash was much like such holiday celebrations in the past. There was little sign that the bar remained in the midst of its most difficult challenge in its 87-year history: the coronavirus pandemic. Over the last two years, there were mask mandates and vaccine checks, rent disputes and 311 complaints, drinks to go and curfews, and patrons who stayed home or fled the city altogether. St. Patrick’s Day 2022 was about as normal as things had been for everyone at Peter McManus Cafe in a long time. But no one knew how long it would last. McManus had fallen behind on rent in March 2020, and the landlord was suing. According to public court documents, McManus owed more than half a million dollars as of fall 2021 — money it didn’t have, given the nearly $1 million less in sales the bar did in 2020 compared to 2019.
Justin’s father, James “Jamo” McManus, watched his son tend bar from his perch on an adjacent red vinyl bar stool, swirling the ice in his vodka cranberry cocktail. Jamo’s was the only drink in the entire bar that night served in a proper glass instead of a plastic cup, which the staff used exclusively on select busy occasions like St. Patricks Day and Halloween. “I don’t like the plastic,” he shrugged. Justin took over running the pub for Jamo in 2008; Jamo officially stepped in for his father, James McManus Sr., in the 1990s, after dropping out of college to work alongside him in the 1970s; James Sr. inherited the job from his father, Peter McManus, the original founder, in the 1940s. Old Irish pubs around the city like Molly’s Shebeen and McSorley’s Old Ale House were erected decades prior, yet over the years, ownership passed from original proprietors to friends or longtime patrons. McManus claims to be the oldest surviving bar of its kind in the city that has been handed down to immediate family members since its inception. “It’s in the blood,” Jamo said somberly, tapping an invisible vein in the crook of his elbow. “We like to host.”
Justin’s great-grandfather opened the bar’s original location in 1911 on 43rd Street and 11th Avenue, but Prohibition prompted Peter to turn it into a convenience store, later reopening the bar at its current Chelsea location. In the 86 years Peter McManus Cafe has stood on the corner of 19th Street and Seventh Avenue, not much has changed inside the pub’s doors: the plaid curtains adorning the windows are the same ones Justin’s stepmother stitched together herself decades ago; the bar cabinets boast original Tiffany stained glass, with one panel featuring a bullet hole from an attempted robbery in the ‘70s; the staff remain largely composed of loyalists, some of whom can say they worked under three generations of McManus men; bartenders still leverage an unofficial “buyback” system to pay for some patrons’ third or fourth drinks.
At the same time, the business evolved over the years: in the 1980s, the family started hiring female employees not just to wait tables in the back cafe but to tend bar; in the early 2000s, they installed flat-screen televisions and started accepting credit cards in addition to cash. The McManus family managed the tenuous balance between consistency and change that ensured the pub’s survival year after year, even as they faced their biggest challenge since Prohibition over a century earlier: the coronavirus.
Per former Gov. Andrew Cuomo’s March 2020 executive order, most bars around the city shut down through June of that year. But the same day McManus’s worn wooden doors closed, its front window opened: a makeshift takeout counter, built by Justin in a matter of hours. At first, they offered food; once they were allowed, they served booze, too. Technically, McManus remained open for business every day of the early pandemic.
As New York reopened and masks came off in the summer of 2020, old and new patrons alike flocked to McManus. But the city had changed — entire floors of office buildings remained unoccupied as employees continued to work from home; once-overcrowded commuter train cars appeared vacant during rush hour; longtime residents fled to the suburbs or to country homes — in ways that could be permanent. Could the legendary Peter McManus Cafe survive and maintain its title of the oldest family-owned and operated bar and restaurant in a post-pandemic New York?
The weekend of March 13, 2020, was the last “normal” one in the city before everything came crashing down. For Craig and Beth Robertson, it was also an occasion all new parents look forward to — the first birthday of their daughter, Warren. There seemed no better place to host Warren’s first birthday party than Peter McManus Cafe, a staple in the couple’s lives since they moved into their apartment around the corner from the bar nearly a decade ago. As the years passed, their frequent visits to McManus transitioned from evening drinks at the bar to weekend lunch outings in the back cafe area. They maintained a tradition of spending New Year’s Day at the pub year after year, partaking in a ritual started by longtime bartender and waitress Eileen O’Connor, fondly referred to as “the phone booth of resolutions.” The McManus staff would place Post-it notes and pens in the bar’s two wooden phone booths (one of which still contained a working pay phone) and invite patrons to write their resolutions for the new year. When indoor dining shut down a few months into 2020, the Post-its from 2019 remained stuck to the wall, an eerie reminder of everything patrons had hoped to achieve in the new year.
The weather on Saturday, March 14, was mild, a taste of spring on the horizon. Beth Robertson arrived at McManus around noon, bags of decorations and two cakes in tow. The couple had rented out the bar’s back area for 40 of their family and close friends, but due to mounting concerns about the COVID-19 virus, only six adults and three kids showed up. Beth scattered duck-shaped confetti across the tables and positioned a value-size pump bottle of hand sanitizer as the centerpiece on one of them. The sanitizer “was so precious,” she said. “I remember the next morning when I woke up, I was like, ‘oh, I really hope I didn’t leave it at the bar, ‘cause you can’t get that now.”
O’Connor was manning the back cafe area that afternoon. She had worked at the pub on and off for 30 years between acting and writing gigs, but that weekend felt different from the hundreds of others she’d worked. As the family gathered around Warren to sing happy birthday, O’Connor placed two yellow cakes adorned with edible yellow ducks in front of the blue-eyed toddler. Ever the entertainer, O’Connor wiggled her fingers behind her ears and stuck out her tongue to try to get Warren’s attention for a photo, helping to blow out the number one-shaped candle. As the cake was sliced and served, O’Connor felt a sinking feeling in her stomach. A thought washed over her: “Had I just done something that could hurt them?”
On Monday, O’Connor woke up with a stuffed-up nose and called in sick, just to be safe. On Tuesday, she was supposed to work the makeshift take-out window the staff had set up in response to news of indoor dining restrictions. Still feeling off, O’Connor stopped into a pharmacy to purchase a thermometer. “They laughed when I asked,” she said, as thermometers were long sold out across the city. A few days later, O'Connor lost her senses of taste and smell — telltale signs of the virus she already knew to look out for. “It turned out that I did have it,” she said.
The next day, Cuomo appeared on MSNBC to encourage hospitality businesses to voluntarily close. “If you don’t need to be open, don’t be open,” he said. Justin turned away from the television at the far end of the bar and looked around. Seated on the bar stools were regulars who frequented McManus back in his father’s heyday; in the kitchen, his staff were brining over 200 pounds of corned beef in Guinness in preparation for St. Patrick’s Day celebrations that week.
McManus was a place that prided itself on keeping its doors open 365 days a year since 1936 — even through September 11, 2001, and Hurricane Sandy in 2012. The only time the bar had voluntarily closed in its 84 years of existence was for a half day back in 1973 when Justin’s grandmother died, so everyone could attend the funeral. “My grandfather warned my father, ‘You’d better not close when I pass!’” Justin recalled. Sure enough, the bar remained open on that day in April 2001. To Justin, it wasn’t even a question — now, almost 20 years later, McManus would do whatever it took to stay open. At the time, he didn’t realize just how difficult that would be.
Dealing with hardship was not new for the McManus family and staff. Equidistant from the NYPD’s 10th precinct and FDNY’s Engine 3, Tower/Ladder 12/Battalion 7 station, the pub was a beloved hangout for first responders for decades. When 9/11 rocked the city, McManus closed to the public and served as a gathering spot for soot-covered cops and firefighters to decompress after harrowing shifts at ground zero. For the first few weeks after the tragedy, the city was completely shut down below 14th Street, making McManus the southernmost bar and restaurant on 7th Avenue. When lower Manhattan residents would wander uptown in search of food and drink, McManus was the first place they’d encounter.
Natasha Cipolli had been working at McManus for five years when she became one of the only bartenders able to work during that first week following the attack. Even Jamo, the proprietor at that time, found himself stranded in Atlantic City. Cipolli took over shifts for McManus staff unable to commute into the city due to bridge closures. “I think I worked 20-hour shifts,” she said. A charismatic comedienne who performed with several comedy troupes when she wasn’t working at the bar, Cipolli was the reason the Upright Citizens Brigade comedy troupe started frequenting McManus in the late 1990s. She helped to open their first theater space in New York, around the corner from the bar, and quickly drew founding members like Matt Walsh and Horatio Sanz into the McManus clan.
In the aftermath of 9/11, Cipolli knew how to give each McManus patron exactly what they needed at the time, whether it was a laugh, a free drink, or a bear hug. “I called it ‘comfort central,’” she said. “It just became an automatic pilot of, I can’t do anything to fix what happened, but I can be here, and I can make sure if someone’s been digging out at ground zero that when they come through the door, I can greet them with a hug and a smile, and I can tell them a joke.”
McManus became solidified in the community as somewhere people could turn to amid tragedy and uncertainty. “A lot of the older cops that have retired now, and the firemen that have retired, they come in and talk about it once in a while,” Cipolli said. “They say, ‘thank you, and this place was so great.’ But that’s the kind of place McManus is.”
Still, the pub isn’t for everyone. A Yelp review from March 2017 included a photo of a heating pipe next to the toilet in the women’s bathroom. “I love this place but they need to fix this,” the author wrote, noting that she burned herself on it. A review from 2013 mentioned overworked staff and uncleared tables: “This place needs a bar rescue. It is a family-owned institution in a nice neighborhood that has to be losing money.”
For every negative review are multiple glowing ones. A review from February 2009 reads, “This is the kind of bar you visit to celebrate the end of another working day with people from all walks of life and revel in the fact that you live in a city that encourages just that.” One from 2019 reads: “Moved in around the corner of this amazing Chelsea bar/restaurant a month ago and have been coming here just about every day since I discovered it. The food is INCREDIBLE (best burgers in the city, hands down), and the bartenders are all friendly and knowledgeable. Peter Mcmanus [sic] is the oldest family-owned bar in NYC and the ambience reflects this.”
The bar’s idiosyncrasies are precisely what draws in old and new patrons alike. “The world is changing, and New York City is changing, but McManus just stays the same,” O’Connor said, gesturing to a rip exposing the foam stuffing of the green vinyl booth she sat in, laughing. “You feel that sense of comfort, even if it’s your first time. I’ve had people come in and they go, ‘I feel like I’ve been here before, but I haven’t.’”
Alongside the half-empty bottles of liquor stacked behind McManus’s bar sit bowling trophies, family photos, a small fish tank, and even an urn containing the remains of longtime bartender Billy Olland. Olland, who passed away in February 2019, wished to rest at the bar he spent most of his life at. Cipolli poured the ashes into the Mets-themed urn herself. “I brought it down to McManus in a cab, a seat belt strapped across it, my body cowering in fear that we were going to get into a cab wreck and I would have Billy all over me,” she said with a chuckle. “Which he would have found hilarious.”
For Jamo, the secret to staying in business this long is a lesson passed on from his father: keep your staff happy. James Sr. set the bar high — twice awarded the Purple Heart in World War II, James Sr. was dedicated to helping those around him. He gave away milk to mothers in the neighborhood during blackouts in 1965 and 1979 and started a clean-up program to improve Chelsea, recruiting participants with the promise of free beer. One story in particular stands out to his grandsons: Before he was hired, a longtime bartender lost his apartment and possessions in a fire. James Sr. told a young Jamo to write him a check. “For how much?” Jamo asked. “Leave it blank,” his father replied. “He can fill it in himself.” The bartender, Bruce McDonald, worked at McManus until he passed away in 2018. His daughter Ryan now tends bar at McManus, following in her father’s footsteps.
There have never been many rules for the McManus staff, many of whom call themselves honorary family members instead of coworkers. Though some staff nowadays choose to don McManus “merch” — hoodies and t-shirts proudly boasting “NYC’s Oldest Family-Owned Bar!” slogans on the back — there are no official uniforms. Employees wear what feels right to them, lending a comfortable feel to an already unpretentious place. Staff members have spent decades working there; O’Connor is one of several employees who have worked for three of the four McManus family managers. “The McManuses have a gift of getting people together that are perfect for this space,” O’Connor said. “There’s a real symbiotic kind of thing that attracts people who have really good hearts.”
When the building’s ownership changed in 2016 and McManus’s physical space was threatened, the customers stepped in to support McManus and its staff. In December 2016, rumors that the pub was on the verge of closing — fueled by a post on the blog Jeremiah’s Vanishing New York — spread through the neighborhood, sparking concern from loyal patrons.
The truth was complicated: In April 2016, the Renatus Group officially closed a $10.5 million sale for two mixed-use buildings in Chelsea, one of which included McManus, from the property’s longtime private owner. Renatus planned to “redevelop the buildings to significantly improve cash flow,” according to a press release on its website. The developer incorporated a demolition clause into the contract, which meant it might only be a matter of time before bulldozers arrived to demolish the original building that housed McManus, which dated back to 1901. Until then, the pub would continue to occupy its historic space on short-term leases.
The blogger didn’t request a comment from the McManus family, which was caught off guard by the surge of public attention. “When it’s your family, it’s a different type of thing,” said Michael McManus, Justin’s first cousin. “You’re not just reading about something in the city that may or may not happen. It’s like — hey, is your family’s history going to remain here?” Justin took to Facebook to set the record straight, laying out the bar’s uncertain future. “It doesn’t solve our long term problem of keeping the place there for your grand kids [sic] to hang out,” he wrote.
A Facebook group named Coalition to #SaveMcManus quickly formed, attracting over 700 members. Longtime regulars and newer devotees teamed up to brainstorm ways to help, from attempting to register the building as a landmark to sharing the bar’s story with local news outlets. Members used the forum to reflect on their favorite memories from over the years. “I met my wife at McManus on a blind date in March of 1988. (Tap beers were a buck then!),” John Grinde wrote. “Been a fan since the early ‘80s. Always felt that The Old Man watched out for our gang of young miscreants,” read a post by Nancy Olson Young, referring to Justin’s grandfather by his nickname.
In the end, the landlord agreed to a one-year extension of the lease, a temporary reprieve from the imminent threat of development. “It keeps our head above water for the time being,” Justin wrote in a Facebook post. “Hearing how much ‘The Store’ means to everyone, makes us want to fight for its survival that much more.”
In a family-owned business, “everyone who takes that torch has to run with it,” Michael said. “If you pass it down to someone who’s not going to do what they need to do, it’s just going to wither away.” The pandemic didn’t stop Justin from running — it just turned his run into a sprint.
In 2020, Justin had tried every idea that popped into his mind to keep the bar afloat. Before the end of March, he built out the merchandise and gift card section of the website, enabling customers to tip staff directly or donate to the bar at large. In April, Justin initiated a flurry of promotions to drive up sales — two-for-one drinks deals, a free shot with every beer ordered. In May, Justin and O’Connor designed new McManus-branded t-shirts emblazoned with tongue-in-cheek slogans like “Stay calm and stay 6 feet back” and advertised them for sale on social media. In June, the staff erected a temporary tent in the sidewalk parking spots out front once the city initiated its Open Restaurants program, complete with wooden benches Justin built himself. In July, Justin replaced the tent with a sturdy wooden structure that could keep patrons dry from summer showers.
But in August, Justin stopped in his tracks when a letter arrived from an attorney representing their landlord, the private equity firm Midwood Investment & Development, which acquired McManus’s building from the Renatus group in March 2017. It was a summons for not paying rent for the prior six months, with damages amounting to nearly a quarter of a million dollars — a number that tripled as the litigation dragged on.
To the new owners, the math was simple, a dilemma familiar to many New Yorkers: rent goes up; if you can’t afford it, you find somewhere else to live. But for Justin, the equation was more complicated. “You haven’t been in an apartment [for] 90-plus years and four generations,” he said. As they negotiated, Justin scouted properties for potential relocations. But nothing measured up; Justin decided that McManus’s decades of history could not be replaced or even replicated anywhere else. “I love this place,” Justin said plainly. “This place is home –— I mean, way more of my home than anyplace I ever had a bed in.”
In the years leading up to the pandemic, change was already underway as McManus adjusted to its new rent. “It meant that the days of offering a $3 pint of beer had to go,” Justin said, though he kept prices as low as he could manage — McManus’s classic hamburger ($12.75) automatically comes with bacon; it’s not priced as an addition. Cafeteria, a hip eatery two blocks away, charges an extra $2 per topping (including bacon) on its standard burger ($18).
Slimmer margins meant McManus didn’t have as significant of a cash reserve to fall back on in 2020. Justin, who did not take a salary for a year during the pandemic, said McManus was “barely breaking even” at the time. In court, the landlord used McManus’s quick pivot to takeout at the start of the pandemic as evidence that they could make rent, arguing that their sales figures were higher than those of restaurants that ceased all operations. Justin said that any external funding McManus received —from federal programs like the Paycheck Protection Program (PPP) or non-profit organizations like the Barstool Fund — went directly to operating expenses like payroll, supplies and utilities.
As autumn progressed and coronavirus cases trended upward, the city began to move backwards. In November, Cuomo implemented a strict 10 p.m. curfew for restaurants and bars, forcing McManus to close six hours early — a potential death knell for a spot often busiest from midnight to 4 a.m. Without the holiday parties that typically make it McManus’s busiest month of the year, December 2020 was McManus’s worst month of the entire pandemic. “What we did the whole month we would do in a good day,” Justin said. And McManus wasn’t alone — according to a New York City Hospitality Alliance survey, 92% of restaurants couldn't afford to pay their December rent.
When the Restaurant Revitalization Fund (RRF) was first announced in spring 2021, Justin felt a surge of hope. “I applied the very first day,” he said. McManus was one of many businesses that did not receive funding; the Small Business Association (SBA) was so overwhelmed with RRF applications that the money ran out quickly. Justin maintained hope that the fund might be extended: The House of Representatives passed a bill in April 2022 that would inject over $40 billion of funding into the RRF, but the bill was not passed in the Senate. Still, Justin is hopeful that return to office mandates might make a difference in McManus’s bottom line. Before the pandemic, after-work happy hours and company outings contributed substantial business to the bar, and the cafe was known for its sizable weekday lunch crowd.
In the summer of 2022, the rent dispute was finally settled. McManus paid the landlord over a million in damages, wiping out the bar's rainy-day fund and dipping into Justin's personal savings to do so. McManus will occupy its property for another six years, per the 10-year lease they signed in 2018, provided they can afford to make their monthly payments.
For now, Justin avoids thinking too far into the future — as all New Yorkers have learned, post-pandemic life is unpredictable. But one thing is certain: McManus will not go down without a fight. Justin’s desire to keep the bar open transcends family obligation; he believes he owes it to McManus’s honorary family of loyal patrons and staff — past, present, and future — to have a place they can return for decades to come. In a city where the only constant is change, McManus is a rare stalwart, a place where — even in the middle of a pandemic, when tables were separated by plexiglass and smiles were shrouded by masks — time slows, strangers become friends, and even the loneliest of souls can be a part of something.
“I can’t let it die on my watch,” Justin said.
Really great piece, thank you so much for telling our story. It's great, really great.
Wonderfully written and researched - THANK YOU for writing about New York City's "local!"