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YES!!! It was Stretches... I went to Drexel with one of his sons - we would all go there & we weren't 21. I remember a band too...

I was only 18 at the time. I don't remember a band but I do remember the dance floor which was raised about two feet off the ground. I always wondered how more people didn't get hurt falling off that stage.

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I was about 18 too and it was in the 90's - I used to think it was in the worst neighborhood when we would pull up & park - I guess it was - back then. I haven't heard from Stretch in years. Funny thing, I looked at those condos at Chatham & didn't even realize it was the same place until recently.

It was Stretch's off and on until about 98, then it was briefly a Latino bar, it closed after a shooting, in 98 0r 99

It was theee underage hang out for TU students in the early 90's - usually Thursday nights.


Funny how much the neighborhood has changed although not too much on that block.

Wow! Jack Stretch's! Now that's a blast from the past! Does anyone remember The Beverly Hills Club in the Bourse Building? Late 80's, early 90's?

Oh I remember Stretch's all to well. As soon as I saw that post headline "15th & Mt. Vernon", the first thing I thought of was Stretch's. That was a pretty bad area at that time. That was a time in Philadelphia when under-age drinking bars were a cottage industry. If you walked into Stretch's on a Saturday night, the place was packed and the average age was about 18. Most of the kids that went there were from Fairmount, Fishtown, and Port Richmond. There were also some kids from East Falls, Roxborough, and Manayunk and a few Temple students thrown in the mix. I was going there around 1988. There was always a little tension between some of the neighborhood guys and everyone else. That tension sometimes boiled into some pretty bad fights. I almost got myself beat to death one night outside the bar one night and I never went back again.

When I look back on that time, it was pretty crazy. An 18 year old kid had his choice of bars that he or she could drink at - Stretch's, Pagano's, the Jailhouse, Smokey Joe's, etc. And in every neighborhood there was one or two local watering holes that would let anyone drink. It just goes to show you the level of corruption and/or disrespect for the law back then.

and yet we all turned out ok...