Bogie's was a restaurant near the corner of Twenty-sixth
Street and Seventh Avenue in New York City owned by Bill and
Karen Palmer. For several years it was THE watering hole for
mystery writers. Most of the early Private Eye Writers of
America luncheons were held there as was one of the earliest
(if not the first) organizing meeting of Sisters In Crime. I
attended several of the PWA gatherings there and they were
great unorganized fun.
I wasn't there for the SiC meeting, something I regret
missing. This was a meeting organized by very serious people
who did not believe women writers were being treated fairly
by publishers or reviewers. Unfortunately, Michael Avallone,
creator of private eye Ed Noon, crashed the meeting, refused
to leave when asked/ordered and heckled throughout. It got
pretty ugly. Mike always felt that when the subject of
publisher's screwing writers came up, he could claim the
floor.
The Palmers were (and probably still are) great folks and I
was very sorry to see Bogie's fold. They had to have been
hurt running tabs for writers and editors. For a time they
were editors of a paperback original line published by
Paperjacks and bearing the Bogie's name. I think I killed the
line as they were about to buy one of mine when Paperjacks
folded.
They were very early into organizing mystery weekends and
made more money doing that than they did at the restaurant.
The last I heard from them was a few years ago when they were
doing a weekend at the Greenbriar and invited me down to play
a role and have a free stay. Alas, I couldn't do it.
There are a fair number of references to Bogie's in mystery
novels published in the 80s. Everyone loved the Palmers even
those who were not running a tab.
Richard Moore
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