Cherry Bombs and Anger: Rodos Bar


Before Ben Kenobi took Luke over to Mos Eisley spaceport, he warned him, saying, "You will never find a more wretched hive of scum and villainy. You must be cautious." As far as we've seen in the Star Wars universe, he was right. The place was loud, packed with transients, and, almost as soon as Ben and Luke walked in, a monster started talking shit, backed up by a buddy.

Welcome, then, to Rodos Bar in Fell's Point.

Arguably the least typical of Fell's bars, Rodos is what I’d call a “party bar”. Much like Jester’s, the chain of frozen alcohol shills in New Orleans, the goal of Rodos is to get you to drink. A lot.

Dance floor lights pulse to Trance Pop as the Orange Crush machines churn alcohol.
 

Sit next to this thing and it'll help drown out the music.

There are printed signs for 50¢ World Famous Cherry Bombs and written in fluorescent pen on the bar mirrors are specials like including Corona-Rita. The attractive, chatty bartenders lean over the bar to push shots, their breasts threatening to spill out of their tank tops.

Of all the things I described in that last paragraph, this picture likely has none of the ones you care about.

The best part about this expedition into Rodos was that, although I walk by it all the time, I’d never actually been in. Mostly because it's a party bar and that means there's often a group of shouting, sweaty bunch of guys, stinking like Axe, hanging around the front, eyeing passersby for an opportunity to fight. I tend to shy away from frat boys like a nerd in an 80s movie shies away from bikers.

"When shots be named after sex acts or be in the form of jello, thar be frat boys." -Old pirate saying

Immediately, I’m introduced to both of my bartenders, Justine and Bobbie Sue, who tell me the Miller Lites are 2 for 1 and, although I haven't had a Miller Lite in 10 years, I go for it. As a friend said when I told him where I was, "You are suffering for your blog, apparently."

Bobby Sue asks where I'm from and is momentarily stunned when I tell her I live two blocks over.

The three guys closest to the door make a show of removing their ties in unison. They have been drinking enough that they’re sure they’re hilarious; although, most of what they’re saying to Justine would get them thrown out of any other bar around here. Plus, it’s more mean and degrading than funny. Justine laughs and it almost sounds genuine.

Bobbie Sue catches Justine's eye every so often and they subtly signal each other like soldiers on patrol. They’re anything but stupid: they’re here to make money.

As the trio of comedic businessmen orders another round of 2-for-1’s, their tone has gotten darker. Angrier. In fact, several of the men in Rodos sound angry. Some are pissed off about work, some about sports. Mostly, though, they’re angry at women. The usual sitcom remarks about nagging wives and girlfriends’ spending habits heard elsewhere are replaced here with an almost violent hatred for a female co-worker or celebrity. It feels dangerous.

The World Famous Cherry Bomb turns out to be Maraschino cherries that have been soaking in what's possibly ethanol.

I pay my tab and make my escape just as the Britney Spears remix gets louder.

My mouth is on fire.

Vote Against Prohibition

Fell's Point still looks somewhat the same as it has for the last 200-plus years. Some of the houses have oval plaques with a year inscribed, telling how long they've been standing, and many of the commercial buildings seen in early 20th century photographs of Thames Street are still recognizable even through decades of cosmetic changes. While comparing some of those old photos, I began to notice the large outdoor advertisements and how, once the trend of painting them fell out of fashion, they were left to fade, too unimportant to even remove.

Circa 1918

This one is unique to the painted signs around Fell's in that it's not an advertisement. Well, not outright, anyway. It might have been put up by a brewery, I suppose, but if so, the message is less an advertisement than it is a warning that you might not be able to buy their beer, or anyone else's, should this message be ignored.

Since the 18th Amendment was proposed in December of 1917 and was ratified in January of 1919, this was likely painted in the year between. That's pretty fascinating.

For about a year, I've been trying to restore this sign, which is on the northern corner of Broadway and Shakespeare,  but the owners of the building won't give me permission. Actually, they won't acknowledge me at all.

"I just rent from them," said the woman who runs the gift shop, "I've given them all your messages but I never get any answers." I get the same statement from the people at the real estate business next door: they're sending along my message but the owners either don't understand what I'm doing or, more likely, just don't care.

I met with members of The Baltimore Bartender's Guild, a group dedicated to preserving the legacy of their trade, and they quickly agreed to fund the restoration of the Vote Against Prohibition sign.

"We've actually tried to get permission before," says the bartender at Rye, located across Broadway Square, "no one ever got back to us."

Port Town/Cold Evening

Back in the 18 and 19th centuries, Fell's Point was a shipbuilding port. It was the only place in Baltimore harbor with enough depth to allow larger-drafted ships to be built, like the schooners that defended Fort McHenry, just across the harbor, during the Battle of Baltimore in 1814. Fell's Point
continued to operate as one of the busiest ports on the East Coast for 200+ years.

Aside from building ships, a port like Fell's was a place to drop cargo, undergo repairs, replenish supplies, and take on new cargo. This means that sailors, out to sea for as long as two months, were cut loose in the area till it was time to ship out again.

Historically, sailors have a notorious reputation due to their transient nature. They wanted to live it up before shipping out again for another harsh tour at sea. The savvy businesses that crowded around the piers offered food, booze, beds, and women; therefore, almost every building still existing in Fell's today was at one time a tavern, pub, inn, or brothel. The few places that weren't any of those were missions or churches, there to catch the fallen souls after a rough night in one of the other establishments.

By the 20th century, the sailors and shipbuilders gave up their bar stools to longshoremen and cannery workers who, after their shift, headed to some of the same establishments that had been supplying the overworked and unruly with alcohol for almost two centuries.

Walking around now, Fell's still has that seedy, nautical atmosphere, heavy with its history, plainly seen in the narrow buildings, their roofs bowed slightly in the middle, occasionally dropping a shingle for no other reason than their age, and the smell of stale beer, prevalent at all hours. The streets retain the Belgian block that held down last century's streetcar tracks: they turn a dull emerald green after it rains. Taverns like Bertha's and Leadbetter's claim a lineage longer than most of the establishments in the area and they feel different inside than the others: darker, older, and claustrophobic, for sure. On a cold, windy Tuesday at dusk, you could believe you're drinking with ghosts.

From what I've heard, you'd be right.

Welcome to Fell's Pint... Er... Point

Five years ago, my partner and I were living in Augusta, Georgia while we waited out her last months in the Army. Although we appreciated a lot of the small-town feel of Augusta, we knew we'd probably want to change it up and move someplace else once she was out, so, I didn't want to get a really great job that would tempt us to stick around. Woth that, I started working at a Starbucks. 

I liked it. It was, I don't know, something I could just do without wondering what to do next. There was no question about it: make the coffee, restock supplies, clean out the coffee making things. No one's saying it was easy, working with the public never is, but I didn't ever have to hear a manager ask, "What are you doing right now?" every time I stopped moving. Because I never stopped moving.

Much as I enjoyed living in Augusta, I grew up in Chicago and missed living in a city. I like walking to the store when I need something or knowing he Chinese place will be open till midnight. Having an bigger art museum somewhat close makes it worth the money to become a member. Plus, I just never felt like a real citizen of Augusta, though I did try.

Referee for the Soul City Sirens roller derby team. I went by "Greg Bladey".

A coworker suggested I request a transfer from Starbucks. Brilliant! There were a few options, one being Baltimore. I'd never been there but I'd heard of the place, mostly through an Army friend who had, luckily, moved back there recently, so I'd have some kind of contact. Other, unrelated, pieces fell into place nicely and before long, I was given my Letter of Transfer.

What happened when I actually got here isn't important to this story (though it's something of a story in itself) but none of the Starbucks in Baltimore wanted anything to do with that Letter of Transfer and, by extension, me. My local friend took my partner and I to the Fell's Point neighborhood so I could drink my sorrows away.

"There's a bunch of bars down there," she said, "And it's a historic district. You guys'll like it."

We turned down one of the house-lined alleys towards the harbor and I was amused by how narrow the row homes were, even more so than everywhere else in the city. I wasn't being critical; rather, it was more like when you're amused about people who live in elaborate tree houses: you think it's pretty great that they live there but, obviously, it's not for everyone.

A lot of my co-workers' back in Georgia lived in these giant "McMansions" with three-and-a-half bathrooms, entryway ceilings that went up to the roof, and a bright green lawn that encircled the home like a moat. Whereas the houses I saw in Fell's were almost comically tiny, being about 10 feet wide with second floor windows directly over the first, and, not only sharing walls with adjacent row homes, as is typical of the style, but also sitting right on the alley, like they were in the street itself.

Ha ha ha: Who in their right mind would live in a house this small?
Oh. Right.

Over the next few hours, whether influenced by alcohol or the atmosphere, we decided we'd buy one of the little houses in Fell's Point and have lived there for almost five years now. I've got my walking distance grocery stores, a late-night Chinese restaurant and an Indian place, and the BMA isn't far. Mostly, I frequent a lot of the bars (one of them is actually named BAR), which I'll get into later.

I've been told a lot of things in Fell's Point, most of them while drinking with neighbors, tourists, and even the bartenders. I listen to their stories because they're entertaining but I believe them because it's even better if I think they're true. This blog is intended to be full of a lot of things I've seen, heard, read about, or been a part of; however, it's not intended to be gossip or malicious or anything like that. Some of our names have been changed out of respect for the neighborhood. So, pull up a barstool and put your wallet away.

Hey, I got this one: you can get me next time.