After sightseeing in St Louis and...

After sightseeing in St Louis and dinner and movie in the Delmar Loop on a recent Friday night, I ventured into Brooklyn around 11pm. If you're coming from the vicinity of Lambert Airport, the best way to get to Brooklyn is to drive east on I-70, take Exit 248A for Salisbury St., and follow signs to McKinley Bridge. Once you've crossed the Mississippi into Illinois, turn right (south) onto IL 3 and drive a few miles, passing through Venice and into Brooklyn. I have visited Hollywood Show Club in Washington Park a couple of times and the dive bars in the same town dozens of times, but always in daylight -- Washington Park in the dark is a scary place!

As it turns out, so is nearby Brooklyn, IL. For the sake of comparison, Washington Park has about 4000 inhabitants, 90+% of them black, with a median household income of about $21,000, while Brooklyn has only about 700 residents, essentially all black, with a median household income under $17,000. Interestingly, it was founded by freed and runaway slaves in the 1830s and is the oldest town incorporated by blacks in the entire country! At one time it was 60% black and 40% white, but when East St Louis got the railroad and Brooklyn didn't, all the whites moved away and the village became 100% black. It is reported that 75% of village revenues come from the four strip clubs in town!

There are four clubs within a block of each other, including Roxy's and PT's across Madison Street from each other. (Bottoms Up and Pink Slip are very close.). Outside of Roxy's I gave $10 to a large but very friendly black guy, who said it was for parking and gave me a ticket that got me into both clubs. To my surprise, most of the customers and about half of the 20 dancers at Roxy's were white. I would have felt weird if I had been the only white guy in an otherwise all-black club (but I probably would have stayed because I was already there). There were always 3-4 dancers on the 3 stages, all of whom quickly got topless, many of whom squirmed around nude on a blanket, and a few of whom actually danced nude. I had a beer, tipped liberally at all three stages, and eventually enjoyed a couple of $25 high-contact nude lap dances. leaving around 12:30. Even though I felt safe enough at Roxy's, I just didn't see many dancers that I wanted to spend any private time with. By the way, the stripper who gave me two dances for $50 originally wanted $40 for one dance or $100 for three but quickly came down to two for $50. I was also quoted a price of $225 for a half hour in the VIP room.