What happened to the Royalty Room????

Everyone in the Youngstown area is well aware of the Palace in the Pines, and the back room called "The Royalty Room." Well, an era ended several months ago as the Royalty Room was closed. For those not aware, The Palace in the Pines had a front bar, which served alcohol, and the ladies wore bikinis and pasties. Then, the back room was fully nude with no alcohol.

Now, everyone who has been back there knew exactly what to expect. Frankie (RIP) screaming at the girls at the top of his lungs, while he sat in the corner chain smoking. In the best days, Ariel (Frankie's wife), Chyna, and Arianna were more than willing to take care of you. On a sidenote, everyone who got a dance with Ariel got the side eyed, dirty look from Frankie. And so, this was honestly the place to go in Youngstown if you wanted "a little extra," and proceeded to be like that for many years.

Now, what happened to this little gem? In my opinion, here are a couple reasons.

1. Ariel left!!!
   Now, one woman doesn't make a club. However, in this case, Ariel did. When Ariel left, so did all the others who were worth coming to see too. Rumor has it, her and Frankie split up.

2. COVID
   Obviously, in 2020 when everything was shut down. I'm sure we all know of a club, or two, that never recovered, or reopened, after the pandemic. The Palace and the Royalty Room did reopen. However, the back room never fully recovered.

3. Frankie passed away
   Say what you want about him, but Frankie kept that place going. Now, we all know of the mafia ties his dad had when the mob basically ran Youngstown. One thing you never had to worry about was the police busting in there and raiding the place. In October of 2020, Frankie passed away. With that, I think the assumed "protection" was gone as well.

If you add all these factors up, you can see how this placed closed. I went in last year for nostalgic reasons, and just shook my head at how it had gone downhill. The lades were low quality and I was asked if I was a cop by each dancer working. That was something I never had to worry about prior to all this.

I'm sure we all have good memories of the Royalty Room. Please feel free to share your memories in the comments. It's pretty amazing when you think about this...at one time, there were four clubs in the Youngstown area. Now, Club 76 is the only one left. Sure, the Palace is still open and doing ok. But it's more of bikini bar now.