My in-laws had this steakhouse in Manhattan that they went to for years and years. It was quite the classy old New York charm. One of those places that was hard to get into. But the in-laws knew a guy, and so they could walk in like stars. They took me there once or twice, and I was glad for it. But the place closed — landlords, man — and then re-opened in some form elsewhere for a few years, but it wasn’t the same, so my father-in-law found himself a new place.
It was two years ago, as far as I know, that they found a new place to call their steakhouse in the city. I’m not sure how they came upon it, but my lovely bride took her parents in for a show and they went to this place. They raved about it. Insisted I had to come with them into the city to go to this place. Full of history, and also the food.
Keens traces its roots back to the 19th century, when the owner’s first joint, a theater man, turned it into a hot spot for the players who trod the boards, and the people who made the plays happen. Many of the walls in the old rambling building are filled with quirky headshots of actors and actresses, most of them forgotten by all but the true connoisseurs. The real item, though, is this.
(Click to embiggen in a new tab.)
That’s supposedly Abraham Lincoln’s playbill. Ford’s Theatre, 1865, the night he was assassinated. The story goes that someone found it after he was shot and picked it up. It passed through a few hands and when Keens took on what is essentially its current form just after the turn of the century, someone found it on the property.
So the second floor has the Lincoln room, and this wall has been devoted to the theme. Here’s an undated article that most likely over-romanticizes the story.
There are framed photos of Lincoln, an image of John Wilkes Booth, a quality reproduction of Booth’s mother that he kept, an 1862 playbill of a show Booth was headlining in Boston. And then there’s this poster, dated six days after Lincoln’s murder and six days before Boston Corbett killed Booth.
Another feature are these pipes. Keens says they have the largest collection of churchwarden pipes in the world. The story in the menu says they once were ordering 50,000 of them every three years. Apparently there was a sort of coat-check style system, and some people left their pipes there. And here are some of the famous ones.
Ted Turner, Stephen King, John Kennedy, Michael Jackson, Jackie Mason, Joseph Heller, Redd Foxx, Arthur Ashe and more have pipes in that case. That one sits right by the door. This one is by the host stand, it’s obviously from a different era.
Please excuse the glare, but in that case the pipe warden placed the spit covered clay pipes of people like Babe Ruth, Will Rogers, Albert Einsten, J.P. Morgan, and many others.
A closer look at Teddy Roosevelt’s pipe. The tradition here started in the early 20th century, so that’s presidential spit on a hard clay pipe that was imported from the Netherlands.
Once upon a time pipe smoking was considered beneficial for dissipating “evil homourse of the brain,” so naturally this was a big thing. The pipes have these thin stems, so they were too fragile to carry, hence the storage and, presumably, the regular big orders the place put in.
I’m guessing MacArthur might have brought and left his own. Looks a bit more ornate, and fits the personality.
Keens’ site says the membership roster of the Pipe Club contained more than 90,000 names. That’s a lot of smoke! And here’s another presidential pipe.
I assume this is the former vice president Adlai Stevenson, not Stevenson II, who was a senator and UN ambassador.
There’s a display case with some signed pipes just thrown in it. No mounts, no labels, just chaotic. This is for a lesser tier of Pipe Club members, I guess. Regular folks pipes?
Just stored on the ceiling. In every possible space.
It’s a steakhouse, but the menu says “legendary mutton.” And when the first woman won the legal right to go into this place in 1905, she sat down and ordered the mutton. She’d been waiting on that. It’s also the first item on the menu. I got that. I was not disappointed.
I was, in fact, too full for the giant desserts, which were giant and delicious.
I’d visit Keens again — that meal was delicious! — but you’re buying.
