Barnett By The Bay - Saloon: Perry's World

By Chris Barnett

Did you hear the one about the San Francisco architect with his date in a cab on Union Street who realizes he’s short of money? “Pull over at Perry’s,” he tells the cabbie. “Wait here,” he tells the woman. “Going in to cash a check. I’ll be right out.”

The (late) barkeep Michael McCourt yells out, ”Hey Russell, the usual?” and pours him a stiff one. Another regular comes over, “Hey Russell. Good to see you tonight. Let me buy you a drink.” Another pal waves from down the bar. “Next one’s on me.”

Ten years later, the architect, Russell Gifford, is perched on his favorite stool at Perry’s and his “date” from that night walks in the door. She spots him. He sees her in the backbar mirror, turns around and cracks,” I thought I told you to wait in the cab.”

Recalled McCourt: “I almost fell on the floor.”

True, it’s a sexist story. Yet on the recent 50th anniversary of the Union Street thirst parlor and restaurant bearing his name, you would never hear that tale told by the proprietor himself, Perry Butler. Never. He’s too much of a gentleman. Plus, deep down, he’s shy and always has been.

In a city where barrooms have morphed from brawling whiskey and beer joints inside canvas tents during the 1849 Gold Rush to palatial libational temples staffed by self-anointed high priests and priestesses of the shot glass who fancy themselves as cocktailians and mixologists, Perry’s on Union stands alone as San Francisco’s last great saloon.

It’s not the oldest bar in town. As seasoned San Francisco elbow benders know, The Saloon in North Beach (an old-time dive bar best known these days for its live music) and Elixir at 3200 16th Street in the Mission (known for its creative cocktailing) are forever battling for that distinction. Both are in locales that have been selling booze in San Francisco since the Civil War.

But these and other half-a-century old or more watering holes around town, with a few notable exceptions, are dive bars or at least divey bars that revel in their antiquity.

Perry’s is not the hippest, hottest and happeningest bar in San Francisco, either where young and beautiful power drinkers pile in with pals to hang-out and catch up, or slide in solo on the prowl and mostly on the make. That was once Perry’s rep—in the ‘70s and early ‘80s when, it was the city’s reigning pick-up bar.

No, what makes Perry’s on Union worthy of this bouquet of journalistic roses is that it hasn’t changed in five decades whereas San Francisco is like another world today.

Philosophically or physically, it opened with friendly, wise-cracking, well-seasoned bartenders who had the wit and brains to banter with customers and keep them coming back.

Add to the conviviality a warm, woodsy late ‘60s décor festooned with photographs, paintings, posters and framed front pages of newspapers that practically cover every square inch of every wall.

And nobody but nobody even attempt to adjusts one of the bar’s visual memories except Perry himself.

What’s more, not even the owner changes. Sure, Butler’s hair is a little grayer and a little shorter at 76 and he’s no longer wearing those loud, plaid, wide sportcoats he sported in the 1970s, But even if you look close, past the fine smile lines that have yet to become wrinkles, he’s still the boyish Dartmouth preppie he was in his twenties when he decided to bail out of the ad agency business and open, along with his former wife, Katherine, a bar and restaurant that mirrored their favorite spot in the upper East Side of Manhattan.

In fact, put two photos of Butler standing at the end of his bar separated by nearly 50 years and it’s downright eerie to see the how the man and his muse are frozen in time. Amazingly, Perry and Perry’s don’t age.

“Perry hasn’t changed the place since the day it opened,” says Mike Fogarty, one of the many Irish Michael’s who have bartended at Perry’s over the years and recently a day bartender at the notorious Balboa Café. “Maybe he’s moved a few pictures around but Perry knows people want consistency. They want the same great drinks, same great burger, same comfortable, familiar place, same personable service.”

Even though his name was on the door, Butler was wise enough to know he wasn’t going to be the star of his own show, says Fogarty. His bartenders were his headliners. They were center stage. “First thing, he hired Michael McCourt and brought him up from Los Angeles. He hired Seamus Coyle. He hired Mike English, the best bartender I’ve ever seen in my life. English could pour drinks, have three dice games going and tell you what the stock market was doing that very minute.”

“You can put a white shirt on a gorilla and he can make a cocktail,” insists Fogarty. “Perry knew the importance of hiring real bartenders. I’m a bartender. If someone calls me a mixologist, I’ll piss on their shoes, Perry knew it was all about regulars. Same guys. Same seats. Same drinks. Everyday. That’s when you know you’ve got a real saloon.”

Irish-born English, who hung up his apron a few years ago, says Butler’s band of merry men and women who worked the bar and the floor were masters at cultivating regulars.

“I’d work the end of the bar nearest to the front door,” he remembers, “and I’d make little bets with myself. If someone walked in and I wanted him as a regular, I’d introduce him to other regulars, make him feel at home, make him a regular. We had these great, incredible customers, Perry was a great guy to work for. He hired all these Irish and Jordanians. I just enjoyed going to work there every day. Actually, I loved it.”

English signed on at Perry’s in the late 70s when the place was really beginning to rock and roll, “It was bedlam night and day. Famous people from all over the United States –politicians, TV and movie people, sports stars—flocked to Perry’s along with regulars because it was the first New York style bar in San Francisco. I did so much drinking I can’t remember it all and that’s why I haven’t had a drink in 34 years. Perry? He was not a drinker. He’s a straight arrow. In all the years I’ve known him I’ve never seen him have more than one alcoholic drink. You can tell he’s not Irish.”

Perry’s on Union is not the place to go if you want to be dazzled by exotic creations where a fruit salad or a vegetable stand is packed into a glass filled with three to five spirits you’ve never heard of or can’t pronounce. The weathered wooden Bullshot sign still hangs from the ceiling, a reminder that Butler imported from New York City the simple but zesty cocktail that marries vodka and beef bouillon. An unpretentious but potent Blood Mary has been a morning, noon and night $8 hangover cure at Perry’s for the entire 50 years. “You can’t believe the amount of tomato juice we would go through on a weekend, says one former bartender.