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Originally from Mississippi, Ben Wash started cooking when he was seven years old. He moved to Austin as a teenager in the late 1950s and learned to grill brisket from older friends. His mother cultivated his love and talent, and at twenty-seven years old, with a bank loan of five hundred dollars and a good eye for bargains, Ben started the Long Branch in his garage. His first building, a Western-inspired place where horses tied up, was built in 1971 and was named after the saloon on the television show Gunsmoke.

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From an interview with Pat Murphy conducted by Harold McMillan: [on successful business owners] "They don't come along that often. You had at that time, you had Charlie Gilden, you had right next door at the Oak Tree, uh, not next door. Up on 12th St. you had George Nichols. George Nichols ran several very successful businesses. He ran the Oak Tree Cafe. He opened the Oak Tree and was very successful. And you had Valle Cannon who helped, well who took over when Johnny Holmes went to Alaska. Valle Cannon ran a very good business there at the Victory."

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Owner/Operator: Flora G. Carlin

 

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H & H Club

Owners/Operators:

• Jason A. Reid
• Thomas S. Plummer
• Lawrence Williams
• Robert Humphreys

 

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Owner/Operator: Ira Littlefield

"'Charlie's brought the white kids from the west side and the runoff enabled the other clubs to have a heck of a business,' he explains. 'Like Sam's on 12th Street and the IL Club across the corner from Charlie's Playhouse. And when Charlie's was full, the kids just said, 'We'll go to the IL Club,' because he had a band, too. They just tore that club down a year or two ago [ca.2001].'" from Margaret Moser's article Bright Lights, Inner City

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Owner/Operator: C. D. Elders and Ira Littlefield

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Owner/Operators: Robert Hobbs and Lorenzo Thompson

"Mississippi-born Lavelle White was already a veteran musician based in Houston when bookings brought her to Austin in the Sixties.
 
'I came to Austin to play,' she says, 'and I played a gob of clubs: Charlie's Playhouse, the Derby, Good Daddy's, Sam's Showcase, the Victory Grill. Joe Valentine had a club, too. There were a lot of clubs there and really in the swing, you know? They were really doing it.'" from Margaret Moser's article Bright Lights, Inner City

 

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Owner/Operators: Ira Littlefield and Frank Moore "Steamboat I was playing alto sax and Bobby was playing trumpet and I forget. Who was that on drums? Oh, Billy Joe Walker on drums. Who was on piano? I believe, if I'm not mistaken, Alton Rezan, who is a local...who is retired and was a local producer of plays. I believe he was on piano. We played at Steamboat for about four or five months as a houseband, playing blues. You know, whine, whine, whine, soddie, oddie and so forth.

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Owner/Operator: Mrs. Willie M. Goode

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