Green Mill Cocktail Lounge
awesome gif animation borrowed from The Green Mill’s site.
Located in Uptown (right off the Lawrence Red Line stop and near the Rivera and the Aragon), at 4802 N. Broadway, lies the Green Mill Cocktail Lounge, a jazz club whose history reaches back to the prohibition era when gangsters like Al Capone used to hang out there.
According to the Green Mill’s website:
“As the twenties roared, The Green Mill became mobster territory when Al Capone’s henchman, “Machinegun” Jack McGurn, gained a 25% ownership of the club. Manager Danny Cohen had given McGurn the 25% stake to “persuade” comedian/singer Joe E. Lewis from moving his act south to the New Rendezvous Café at Clark and Diversey. McGurn managed to convince Lewis by slitting his throat and cutting off his tongue. Miraculously, Lewis recovered, but his songs never regained their lush sound. The incident was later immortalized in the movie The Joker is Wild, with Frank Sinatra as Joe E. Lewis and a Hollywood soundstage as The Green Mill. Of course, his interest piqued, Sinatra had to visit the club.”
The Green Mill is one of the best, if not the best, places to see live jazz in the city, and it’s atmosphere is nostalgic and has a cool, speakeasy vibe. Also, every Sunday they host the Uptown Poetry Slam. The Green Mill is open until 4 a.m. Mon-Fri and until 5:00 a.m. on Saturday.
picture of the trap door behind the bar, a relic from the speakeasy days. The trap door still leads to a tunnel that was used to run liquor up via a hydraulic elevator to patrons.