Tavern Week is a week-long celebration of America's historic taverns that takes place each September. Past programming has included special evening lectures, exclusive videos, social media highlights from tavern museums across the country, and much more.
Explore the 2020 events below.
Fraunces Tavern Museum and Restaurant will be hosting a series of free outdoor events throughout the summer. Pick up a free Tavern Week Events Passport at any of these special events. Keep your passport in a safe place and bring it with you to each special event to collect a sticker. You can earn up to five stickers: one for each event you attend and one for visiting Fraunces Tavern Museum, located on the second floor of 54 Pearl Street.
Submit your completed passport to Fraunces Tavern Museum by September 19, 2021, to redeem it for prizes. All participants will receive a prize; more stickers equals a bigger prize. All participants will also be entered into our Grand Prize raffle. The more stickers you receive, the more entries you will get in the raffle. Submission guidelines and prizes.
All events are free and will take place outdoors at Fraunces Tavern Restaurant in a reserved seating area. Registration is required for each event. Patrons are also required to order food and/or drink to participate in each event. It is strongly encouraged that patrons make an additional reservation at Fraunces Tavern Restaurant. Reserve a table.
Please note: Some events only open to patrons age 21 and over. Please bring a valid form of ID to participate.
On the Blog
The Stadt Huys, Lovelace Tavern, and the Excavation of History
In honor of Fraunces Tavern Museum’s first-ever Tavern Week, Communications & Marketing Coordinator Allie Delyanis explores the history of one of 54 Pearl Street’s forgotten neighbors: the Lovelace Tavern.
Read the full story.
Virtual Lecture
America Walks Into A Bar
Special Lecture | Wednesday, September 16 | 6:30pm
Presented by Christine Sismondo*
What do we lose when our bars are shuttered? These can seem like frivolous spaces, but they have played an important role in American history. In this lecture, Christine Sismondo will explore the role of bars across the country's history, including the colonial era, Prohibition, the 1960s, and today.
On the Podcast
Tavern Talks, Episode 104: Neirs Tavern
On each episode of Tavern Talks, hosts Mary Tsaltas-Ottomanelli and Allie Delyanis dig into the early Colonial Revolutionary War Era, and highlight upcoming Museum events and programs.
As part of Fraunces Tavern Museum’s Tavern Week celebration, Mary Tsaltas-Ottomanelli and Allie Delyanis sit down with Loycent Gordon and Edward Wendell from Neirs Tavern and discuss each building’s storied history.
About Neirs Tavern
Among the oldest and most historic bars in the country, Neir’s Tavern is located in the Woodhaven area of Queens in New York City, near the Brooklyn border. Over 190 years old, it is one of the few old drinking establishments that have been in almost continuous operation (Prohibition notwithstanding) and in the same location, for its entire history. Neir’s is known as the tavern where as a child, Mae West used to dance (and possibly first performed) in the ballroom, which featured a wooden balcony with small hotel rooms around the upper walls, similar to the Wild West dancehalls of the movies and television.
Listen to the full episode.
Exclusive Video
Drink to History at Fraunces Tavern
Fraunces Tavern Restaurant Beverage Manager Barry Smyth makes Presidential Punch and a Cucumber Gimlet and describes how you can make them both at home!
On Social Media
Social Media Takeovers by Gadsby’s Tavern Musem, Keeler Tavern Museum, and Golden Ball Tavern Museum
Fraunces Tavern Museum is excited to share the work of three other Tavern Museums on social media throughout the week. Keep an eye out for their social media posts on the FTM channels.
Facebook / Twitter / Instagram
About the Participants
Gadsby’s Tavern Museum (9/14)
Gadsby's Tavern Museum consists of two buildings, a ca. 1785 tavern and the 1792 City Tavern and Hotel. In those seven short years, the young Republic began to take shape through the conversations and choices being made in these tavern spaces. The impact of these choices and how far to extend power—political, economic, and social—is still being felt today. Named for Englishman John Gadsby who operated them from 1796 to 1808, the tavern businesses were central to Alexandria’s port-based economy, offering spaces to dine, entertain, and spend the night. A large enslaved labor force made Gadsby’s renowned hospitality possible. Notable patrons that enjoyed this hospitality included George and Martha Washington, Thomas Jefferson, and the Marquis de Lafayette.
Keeler Tavern Museum (9/16)
The Keeler Tavern Museum has been a farmhouse, tavern, stagecoach stop, post office, hotel for travelers and the home of noted architect Cass Gilbert. In 1966, a group of interested residents in Ridgefield decided to preserve its rich history and established it as a museum.
Golden Ball Tavern Museum (9/18)
The Golden Ball Tavern Museum of Weston, Massachusetts, is a pre-Revolutionary home and Tavern. It was established by a Loyalist to the British cause whose beliefs were put to the test in the lead up to the Revolution. Isaac Jones, a prominent citizen of a small town outside Boston, established the Tavern in 1768, the same year that British warships were sent to Boston Harbor. Jones chose to defy the boycott of British tea, harbor British spies and was subjected to an angry mob which threatened his family and livelihood. The museum looks at the Loyalists with fresh eyes and examines well-documented accounts of what it meant to be an average citizen of the day during a time of great tumult in the colonies
