Surely, by now, after 88 years, most everyone knows Bryant’s Cocktail Lounge, 1579 S. 9th St., the history of which you can read here.
But, recently, owner John Dye stumbled on a bit of foggy Bryant’s history.
On social media posts, Dye shared a photo of a matchbook advertising “Bryant’s Central Rafters” at 2218 W. Wells St.
“We’ve uncovered a fascinating piece of Bryant’s history,” he wrote. “For years, we’d heard rumors about a second Bryant’s location, established by our second owner, Pat Malmberg, along with the Dimiceli family, who owned the beloved Rafters steakhouse on South 27th.
“Shirley Lafferty, our manager of over 45 years, once told us it was called ‘Bryant’s Rafters’ – though it didn’t last long. Despite our searches, we could never find any evidence of this short-lived second spot. But then, we found this rare Rafters matchbook.”
Digging through newspapers, I found that it’s likely the place operated from the beginning of 1975 until that autumn before returning to its previous name Top O’ the Town (aka Top-Of-The-Town),
According to Malmberg’s daughter, Patti, “Pat had worked for Frank (Dimiceli) at Top of the Town on Wells Street in 1957 and they remained lifelong friends.”
During its brief run, the partnership advertised an all you can eat chicken fry on Wednesdays and Thursdays and an AYCE fish fry on Fridays.
Both included relishes, potato pancake, fresh Italian bread and butter and the while the $2.95 chicken fry was accompanied by macaroni salad, the fish fry (at the same price) had potato salad on the side.
When the restaurant opened, the earliest ads noted that it specialized in Italian and American cuisine. “Our steaks and ribs are carefully prepared and charcoal broiled to your specifications.”
Dye says that Lafferty, who passed away in 2023, recalled that Malmberg, “hated spreading his attention between two places.”
He adds, “I think the most interesting part of the history is pre-Bryant’s when it was a high-end supper club in a tiny little building on the near west side. Mom and pop supper clubs were such a unique thing.”
It’s true that the 1888 Queen Anne building, which had a retail box added to the front – the whole thing is now long gone – had a long history of taverns and restaurants, dating back to just after the end of Prohibition.
In the early 1930s, the retail space in the building was home to one of the multiple locations of Economy Cleaners. When Repeal arrived in early 1933, George W. Schmitz applied for a tavern license, but was denied, along with seven other applicants, because their locations were either too close to a church or school or because they planned to open on a second floor or in a basement. At the time the Common Council was only issuing licenses for ground floor taverns.
Interestingly, one of the others denied that day was Joseph Dimiceli, who wanted a license for his place at 429 N. Jackson St. in the Third Ward.
However, by the following April, Schmitz’s Club Cafe was open, run by his son Phil.
(Side note: around the same time the initial license request was denied, Schmitz’s wife Lucille was wielding a shovel at the groundbreaking for a cooperative brewery on Milwaukee’s South Side. You know I’ll be, ahem, digging into this to find out more. Stay tuned.)
For the remainder of the ‘30s, the place was called the Balcony Club Cafe and by the dawn of the 1940s it was run by Sidney Leet and Erich G. Bendler, who had their license revoked when it was charged that Leet had served an underage girl. However, it turned out that testimony about her age was incorrect and the license was restored.
However, on Dec. 31, 1946, “the newly remodeled Top O’ the Town cocktail bar – food served” hosted a grand re-opening and it seems at this time it was already owned by Dimiceli and, for a time, perhaps a partner named Aaron Peckarsky.
Born in Italy, Dimiceli came to America and settled first in Chicago, where he opened a bar and restaurant in 1918. Three years later he arrived in Milwaukee and opened a place on Detroit Street (now St. Paul Avenue).
In 1927, he moved to the 429 N. Jackson St. space for which his 1933 tavern license had been denied.
In 1960, Dimiceli opened the Rafters cocktail lounge, restaurant and motel at 7228 S. 27th St. in Oak Creek with his son Frank, and it ran at the same time as Top of the Town for many years, despite the elder Dimiceli’s passing in 1963.
By 1973, with the matriarch of the Dimiceli family still living upstairs, the family rented the Top O’ the Town space to Frank Trovato Jr., who opened an Italian restaurant.
At the same time, the Dimiceli family also owned a bar called the Beverly Club at 2111 W. Wells St.
Trovato had experience working for Sally Pipia, first at her place at 431 W. Michigan St. in the 1960s. When that location was destroyed by fire, Pipia brought Trovato along to her new place in the Knickerbocker Hotel.
Trovato's Wells Street restaurant had just 36 seats and when his “high class” Italian eatery became a Milwaukee hotspot, Trovato – who cooked alongside his mother Angelina – needed more space. That led him to move in late 1974 to the 1550 N. Farwell Ave., where he rented from Frank LaGalbo the restaurant that Chico’s had vacated for the space that’s now home to Elsa’s. (Read more about that here.)
This is when the Bryants / Rafters experiment arrived on the scene.
"I worked with Frank Trovato and his mother, then with Pat and Shirley at (Bryant's Rafters) while also working and living at the Rafters," says Frank Dimiceli's stepson Dean Laplant. "Those were some great memories for me."
After its brief run, the space went back to the Top O’ the Town name, continuing to serve food, including a fish fry, homemade lasagne and spaghetti with sausage.
The last ad appeared in 1982 – at which point it had become Talk of the Town – and it would appear the building came down not too long after, though I don’t know exactly when.
"My step-grandmother Rosie (Dimiceli) lived upstairs and we didn't want her to be alone in that deteriorating neighborhood," Laplant recalls. "When we finally got her to move in with us at the Rafters, Frank sold the 22nd street property."
The Rafters, meanwhile, endured until 2010, when it closed for good, despite suggestions that it might reopen.
Laplant and his brother left the Rafters, but not the restaurant business and it seems that the Rafters never really left them.
"I opened up the Steakout in Greendale in 1986 and sold it two years ago to my manager Bobby Lombardo," he says. "I now own DC Steakhouse in Chandler, Arizona and my brother Jerry owns Palmer's Steakhouse in Hartland.
"All those restaurants came from our experience with the Dimiceli family, and a touch of bar expertise from my old friend Pat Malmberg!"
It would be great to know more about this brief but interesting partnership, so if you know anything about it, drop me an email.
Meanwhile, Dye will treasure the matchbook, which, he says, “opens up a wonderful window into our past.”
Also opening a window is Patti Malmberg’s comment...
“As long as I'm reminiscing, do you also know about the Live A Little Club that Pat and his friend Kenny Johnson of the Stadium Club in West Milwaukee ran? Most members were customers of Bryant's or the Stadium Club.
“Two or three times a year Pat and Kenny would charter jets through United Airlines and fly out to Vegas on a Monday and return on Thursday. Club members got their flight and hotel as a package deal. This was in the late ‘60s and early ‘70s.”
Adding this to the to-do list, too.
Born in Brooklyn, N.Y., where he lived until he was 17, Bobby received his BA-Mass Communications from UWM in 1989 and has lived in Walker's Point, Bay View, Enderis Park, South Milwaukee and on the East Side.
He has published three non-fiction books in Italy – including one about an event in Milwaukee history, which was published in the U.S. in autumn 2010. Four more books, all about Milwaukee, have been published by The History Press.
With his most recent band, The Yell Leaders, Bobby released four LPs and had a songs featured in episodes of TV's "Party of Five" and "Dawson's Creek," and films in Japan, South America and the U.S. The Yell Leaders were named the best unsigned band in their region by VH-1 as part of its Rock Across America 1998 Tour. Most recently, the band contributed tracks to a UK vinyl/CD tribute to the Redskins and collaborated on a track with Italian novelist Enrico Remmert.
He's produced three installments of the "OMCD" series of local music compilations for OnMilwaukee.com and in 2007 produced a CD of Italian music and poetry.
In 2005, he was awarded the City of Asti's (Italy) Journalism Prize for his work focusing on that area. He has also won awards from the Milwaukee Press Club.
He has be heard on 88Nine Radio Milwaukee talking about his "Urban Spelunking" series of stories, in that station's most popular podcast.
