These Female Bartenders Feature College Backgrounds

The Ann Arbor News, Sunday, August 13,1972  3

These Female Bartenders Feature College Backgrounds

By Jan Stucker
(News Staff Reporter)

What do you do if you’re a teacher who can’t find employment? Or if you have college or advanced degrees but want training in a field where the job market is promising?

Become a bartender like the seven young women at Mackinac Jack’s in Ann Arbor, a new nightclub which opened a few weeks ago.

The women bartenders — two of whom have attended bartending school — all have some college training. Most have bachelor’s or advanced degrees —and most became bartenders for practical, economic reasons.

Bette Freedman, who has a secondary teaching certificate from Eastern Michigan University and is a former substitute teacher in Detroit, became a bartender when it became obvious she couldn’t find a teaching job for this fall. “Being a bartender is better and safer than substitute teaching in Detroit,” she says.

Debbie Spencer said she went into the business because “there’s a great demand for women bartenders right now. So I knew I could get a job.” Ms. Spencer also had a sentimental reason for learning bartending: her grandfather was a well-known bartender for many years in the Upper Peninsula. Debbie currently is enrolled at Michigan State University’s School of Music, and recently completed a 10-week course in bartending at a Lansing community college.

Vicky McPherson, who formerly fished commercially for salmon in Oregon, likewise attended bartending school in Chicago. An honors graduate in history from Michigan State University, Ms. McPherson says she became a bartender “so I could get a job anywhere. I plan on being mobile for the next few years, and since drinking is popular all over the world, I thought it would be good experience and would mean sure jobs.”

Kathy Schwartz, a former cocktail waitress in New York, earned a master’s degree in special education for the emotionally disturbed at the U-M. Kathy says she applied for a bartending job at the establishment in New York where she was a cocktail waitress a few years ago, but was turned down.

“Women’s [sic] just weren’t hired as bartenders then,” she says. “But recently they told me they’d give me a job as a bartender there if I want it.”

Mary Dee Bartolemei, one of Mackinac Jack’s managers who subs as a bartender when needed, has attended several universities and has many years of experience as a waitress at various local establishments.

The other manager-bartender is Maureen Ferrel. Diane Perkins is the seventh bartender.

Harold Maridon, the huge, red-bearded co-owner of the nightclub, says he has hired women because “they make the best bartenders. Women have good business and bar sense and learn very quickly,” Maridon insists. “And they’re very hard workers.”

Maridon, a former pro football tackle for the San Francisco 49ers and the Canadian Edmonton Eskimos, maintains there is “a lot of untouched talent running around who have never had a chance to break into the business.” The ex-gridiron player, who has owned and managed a number of bars and nightclubs throughout the country, explains that bartending in most of the big cities is unionized and therefore has always been the sanctuary of men.”

But the times are changing.

The young women at Mackinac Jack’s feel there is a certain amount of prestige being a bartender today. “When I tell people my occupation they say, ‘Oh,’ ” says Bette Freedman. Debbie Spencer agrees it’s a “fairly respectable” position.

And all agree it’s fun, especially when they are asked to make odd or interesting drinks. The women have a special card file and a book containing drink recipes which they can refer to if they’re stymied. But they say the job is not that difficult.

“It’s like a big mystery to most people, but it’s really not that hard,” comments Ms. McPherson. The women explain that drinks can be categorized as cream, fruit, highballs and shots, — plus beer and wine. Most drinks in the categories are made in a similar way, so the trick is simply learning to categorize the orders, they say.

The bartenders say they serve more beer during the day, and more mixed drinks at night. And they confide they get to know their customers by the drinks they order. “It takes quite a while before you get to learn the customers’ names,” says Mary Dee. “You get to know them - by the drinks they order. ‘Here comes whiskey sour,’ we say.”

Do the women serve as “amateur psychiatrists” to customers who like to use bartenders to tell them their troubles? “We’re so busy we really don’t have time to listen,” one of the women says. “But a lot of customers would like us to.”

(Maridon says that the U-M Department of Mental Health recently began giving classes to Detroit bartenders on responding to the emotional problems voiced by their customers. The classes will soon be given to Ann Arbor bartenders, he says).

The women say they have been generally well accepted by their customers, who are predominantly male. “We’re here to provide a service, and we’re looked on that way,” Ms. Spencer offers. Mary Dee remembers one put-down from a male customer, however: “You count real well for a girl,” he told her as she was giving him his change.

But the women believe that bartending still is not too common for a woman, though more and more females are being hired today, especially in smaller cities and towns. One of the girls, for instance, tells of recently filling out an application and writing down “bartender” in the occupation slot. When it was returned to her, her occupation had been altered to read “waitress.”

Maridon says that female bartenders have been common on the West Coast for the past 10 years, though it is still relatively unusual on a large scale in the Midwest and East. “It takes a long time for the East and West Coast to come together,” he says.

None of the women said they planned to be bartenders forever, and most of them eventually hope to land jobs in their trained professions when the job market improves. (Two of the women, in fact, said their parents were unhappy with their bartending jobs and wanted them to use their college degrees). But on an interim basis, all agreed it’s an “excellent job” which pays well.

And at least one of the women’s fathers is extremely proud of his daughter’s occupation. Debbie Spencer, whose grandfather was a bartender for years and something of a legend in the Upper Peninsula, says her Dad has been telephoning all his friends to tell them happily about her job.

[Image Caption: 

Some Service For Colleagues

Bette Freedman, a former substitute teacher in Detroit serves up drinks to two of her fellow bartenders (from left), Kathy Schwartz and Debbie Spencer, during one of their days off. The young women are three of the seven all-female bartending staff at Mackinac Jack's, a new nightclub in Ann Arbor. Most of the women bartenders have college or advanced degrees and have taken bartending courses. (News photo by Robert Chase).]