Here white detectives dare not travel except in pairs; here rent-collectors dare not go about or enter buildings without cops to guard them; here is no place for sightseers or any strangers.
Here rove the numerous gangs, members ranging in number from a dozen to several hundred and in age from almost babyhood to the "heavy workers," who include many ex-convicts.
Harlem first got on the map as a place to have fun during the 1920's, when an imaginative fellow named Lee Posner, who later adopted as a middle name "Harlemania," saw its possibilities after the Chicago "black-and-tan" fad had risen to popularity. Jack Johnson, the ex-heavyweight champion, had a saloon on Seventh Avenue. This became the Cotton Club which, with all Harlem, started toward world-wide fame.
Prohibition was in effect if not in force, but the snoopers passed this district up.
The black part of Harlem was tucked away in the northern half of what is now the section. Its main cross street, 125th, was still lined with fine shops and branches of downtown department stores. Below that thoroughfare old New York families still lived and there were excellent apartment buildings and elegant residences.
By 1930, the Negroes had everything from 110th Street up to the Polo Grounds, at 155th Street, to themselves.
Repeal brought a change to Harlem's night life. The fad had worn thin and the attractions of unlimited liquor and no set hours had faded. Some of the glitter spots moved downtown—Connie's Inn, the Cotton Club, the Ubangi. New cabarets with all-Negro talent began to spring up in the center of town.
When the casual pleasure-seekers forsook Harlem, a few wise boys took over in side-street locations. New York's legal liquor and cabaret closing deadline has been 4 A.M., since repeal. But that was too early for some, especially those connected with the major night clubs, who quit work at that hour and then wanted to play.
Harlem, which was not being called to account on police regulations, took up where the big ones left off.