The Manhattan Club was a nightclub located at 1312 Broadway in

East St. Louis, Illinois East St. Louis is a city in St. Clair County, Illinois. It is directly across the Mississippi River from Downtown St. Louis, Missouri and the Gateway Arch National Park. East St. Louis is in the Metro-East region of Southern Illinois. Once a b ...

. The club has a prominent place in

Greater St. Louis Greater St. Louis is a bi-state metropolitan area that completely surrounds and includes the independent city of St. Louis, the principal city. It includes parts of both Missouri and Illinois. The city core is on the Mississippi Riverfront on t ...

music history. It is best known for being the club where teenaged

Tina Turner Tina Turner (born Anna Mae Bullock; November 26, 1939) is an American-born Swiss retired singer and actress. Widely referred to as the "Honorific nicknames in popular music, Queen of Rock 'n' Roll", she rose to prominence as the lead singer o ...

met her future husband, bandleader

Ike Turner Izear Luster "Ike" Turner Jr. (November 5, 1931 – December 12, 2007) was an American musician, bandleader, songwriter, record producer, and talent scout. An early pioneer of 1950s rock and roll, he is best known for his work in the 1960s and 1 ...

. The building was destroyed by fire in 2010.

History

In 1954, Ike Turner moved his band, the

Kings of Rhythm The Kings of Rhythm are an American music group formed in the late 1940s in Clarksdale, Mississippi and led by Ike Turner through to his death in 2007. Turner would retain the name of the band throughout his career, although the group has underg ...

, from Clarksdale to East St. Louis. There he met a man named Booker Merritt who owned a brick building on Broadway. Turner and his band gut renovated the building and created the Manhattan Club where they would practice and perform. The Manhattan Club was initially a predominantly

African-American African Americans (also referred to as Black Americans and Afro-Americans) are an Race and ethnicity in the United States, ethnic group consisting of Americans with partial or total ancestry from sub-Saharan Africa. The term "African American ...

club. Turner also played at the white clubs in St. Louis such as the

Club Imperial The Club Imperial was a nightclub owned by George Edick (1928 – 2002), located at 6306-28 West Florissant Ave. in north St. Louis. During the club's heyday in the 1950s through the 1960s, acts such as Ike & Tina Turner, Chuck Berry, and Bob Kuban ...

, and soon gained a large following from white teenagers. Turner's competition in the

St. Louis St. Louis () is the second-largest city in Missouri, United States. It sits near the confluence of the Mississippi and the Missouri Rivers. In 2020, the city proper had a population of 301,578, while the bi-state metropolitan area, which e ...

club scene was musician

Chuck Berry Charles Edward Anderson Berry (October 18, 1926 – March 18, 2017) was an American singer, songwriter and guitarist who pioneered rock and roll. Nicknamed the " Father of Rock and Roll", he refined and developed rhythm and blues into th ...

who once brought bluesman

Muddy Waters McKinley Morganfield (April 4, 1913 April 30, 1983), known professionally as Muddy Waters, was an American blues singer and musician who was an important figure in the post-war blues scene, and is often cited as the "father of modern Chicago b ...

to watch Turner perform. Other musicians who performed at the Manhattan Club include

Little Milton James Milton Campbell Jr. (September 7, 1934 – August 4, 2005), better known as Little Milton, was an American blues singer and guitarist, best known for his number-one R&B single " We're Gonna Make It". His other hits include "Baby, I Love ...

Oliver Sain Oliver Sain Jr. (March 1, 1932 – October 28, 2003) was an American saxophonist, songwriter, bandleader, drummer and record producer, who was an important figure in the development of rhythm and blues music, notably in St Louis, Missouri. B ...

, and

Albert King Albert Nelson (April 25, 1923 – December 21, 1992), known by his stage name Albert King, was an American guitarist and singer who is often regarded as one of the greatest and most influential blues guitarists of all time. He is perhaps b ...

. Tina Turner (then called Ann Bullock) recalled that she "almost went into a trance" when she first saw Ike Turner perform at the Manhattan Club. One night in 1957, she was given the microphone by his drummer Eugene Washington during an

intermission An intermission, also known as an interval in British and Indian English, is a recess between parts of a performance or production, such as for a theatrical play, opera, concert, or film screening. It should not be confused with an entr'acte (F ...

and she sang the

B.B. King Riley B. King (September 16, 1925 – May 14, 2015), known professionally as B.B. King, was an American blues singer-songwriter, guitarist, and record producer. He introduced a sophisticated style of soloing based on fluid string bending, shimm ...

blues ballad The term blues ballad is used to refer to a specific form of popular music which fused Anglo-American and Afro-American styles from the late 19th century onwards. Early versions combined elements of the European influenced "native American ballad" ...

, "

You Know I Love You You Know I Love You may refer to: * "You Know I Love You", a song by The Pigeon Detectives The Pigeon Detectives are an English indie rock band from Rothwell in Leeds, West Yorkshire, who formed in 2004. The band have released five albums from ...

." Impressed by her voice, Turner added her as a featured vocalist with his Kings of Rhythm; they later formed the duo

Ike & Tina Turner Ike & Tina Turner were an American musical duo consisting of husband and wife Ike Turner and Tina Turner. From 1960 to 1976, they performed live as the Ike & Tina Turner Revue, supported by Ike Turner's band the Kings of Rhythm and backing vocal ...

. East St. Louis poet

laureate In English, the word laureate has come to signify eminence or association with literary awards or military glory. It is also used for recipients of the Nobel Prize, the Gandhi Peace Award, the Student Peace Prize, and for former music direc ...

Eugene Redmond Eugene B. Redmond (born December 1, 1937, St. Louis)Burton, Jennifer"Eugene Redmond" ''Oxford Companion to African American Literature''. is an American poet, and academic. His poetry is closely connected to the Black Arts Movement and the city ...

recalled that in the 1950s Tina Turner was a "

teeny-bopper A teenybopper is an early teenage girl who follows adolescent trends in music, fashion, and culture. The term may have been coined by marketing professionals and psychologists, later becoming a subculture of its own. The term was introduced in ...

and a

groupie The term groupie is a slang word that refers to a fan of a particular musical group who follows the band around while they are on tour or who attends as many of their public appearances as possible, with the hope of meeting them. The term is usu ...

." She used to hang around the Manhattan while Turner was practicing. Turner's band was very popular and he had a strong following of female admirers. Redmond gave him the nickname "Ike Turner, the Woman Burner" because he was "known to run through women." Tina Turner later wrote a song titled "Club Manhattan," on the Ike & Tina Turner album ''

Nutbush City Limits "Nutbush City Limits" is a semi-autobiographical song written by Tina Turner which commemorates her rural hometown of Nutbush in Haywood County, Tennessee, United States. Originally released as a single on United Artists Records in August 19 ...

'', as homage to the Manhattan Club. In 1967, Albert King was performing at the Manhattan Club when promoter Bill Graham offered him $1,600 to play three nights at the

Fillmore West The Fillmore West was a historic rock and roll music venue in San Francisco, California, US which became famous under the direction of concert promoter Bill Graham from 1968 to 1971. Named after The Fillmore at the intersection of Fillmore Stre ...

in San Francisco. The club had various names changes over the years, but was last known as the Four Aces. In later years, it housed a liquor store in the front and a bar in the back. The other half of the building was a club. The Disco Riders, a 32-member motorcycle club, owned and operated the club, and on Saturday nights hosted dance parties. The building was vacant when it was destroyed by a fire in 2010.

References

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