This is why in many bars of this period women were required to enter through a separate door marked with a sign reading “Ladies’ Entrance” and had to drink in a room in the back of the building. The presence of women was a potential threat to their enjoyment of male camaraderie and their sense of masculinity. Working-class bars and saloons between the late 1800s and the beginning of Prohibition were the domain of men, a place to escape the demands of both work and family. 100 years ago women were also treated like a separate class of people in bars–one to be avoided, segregated, and tolerated. In bars that host such theme nights, women are treated like a separate class of people, one to coax and goad into giving men their undivided attention. | Photo: Michael BixlerĮveryone knows that when bars advertise Ladies’ Night it is less so for the ladies and more so for straight men who hope to flirt, hook up, or even find love. McKenna’s Bar at 7322 Frankford Avenue in Mayfair.
