Ah, the great tradition of the local bar. It’s a home away from home for some, a place to come in from the rain, where everybody knows your name. But could the basic, no-frills bar be headed for extinction?
Author Amy Yates Wuelfing believes so, and that was one of the reasons she put together an oral history of the venerable John & Peter’s in New Hope, Pennsylvania. Created along with co-authors Joan Arkuszewski and Loren Hunt, “Still Drinkin’ & Smokin’, Still Rockin’ & Rollin’: An Oral History of New Hope’s John & Peter’s” (DiWulf Publishing) has been five years in the making.
It’s a rollicking and honest read, like you’re seated at the bar at John & Peter’s having a conversation with one of the regulars.
Crafted through hours of interviews and archival research, with a lot of COVID lockdown time helping to produce the bulk of the writing, this comprehensive oral history lays out the narrative of a small, charming dive bar that has persevered through the decades by providing the local community with entertainment and a sense of belonging. The book is enhanced with poetry by longtime John & Peter’s employee Dylan Tindell, as well as photography by Jack Rosen.
“As bars and clubs become more and more homogenized, preserving the history of a place like John & Peter’s is priceless,” Wuelfing says. “It’s the idea of one man (founder John Larsen, who died just a few months ago) starting a coffee shop that became a beacon for artists in every medium. One person can make a difference to an entire community, and this, even more than the music, is what makes this such a rich and textured story.”
“John & Peters is so unique, kind of like CBGB (in NYC),” she says. “It’s self-sustaining, a community, really intimate and supportive of original music. That’s always been a problem with bar owners — they don’t want original music. To make money, they want bands who play covers, dance songs, etc., because that’s what draws crowds.”
“So it’s harder and harder to find venues that do this, but John & Peter’s still does,” she adds. “There’s always some kind of live entertainment there, either music, sometimes a DJ or comedy, but there’s something 365 days a year.”
Wuelfing will be at Randy’s Now Man Cave in Hightstown from 4 to 6 p.m. on Saturday, December 16 to talk about and sign “Still Drinkin’ & Smokin,’ Still Rockin’ & Rollin’.” She is also the author of the critically acclaimed oral history “No Slam Dancing, No Stage Diving, No Spikes” (about City Gardens in Trenton) and the anthology “Hard Times Magazine: An Anthology of ’80s Punk & Hardcore.”
Stories of wild nights, outstanding performances, and general “rock n’ roll weirdness” abound in the new book, as the co-authors have set out to capture as much of the history as possible through an exhaustive series of interviews with the staff, the owners (both new and old), the New Hope community, and, of course, the artists.
John & Peter’s is often mentioned with the same reverence of storied cantinas and vaunted, intimate gathering places like CBGB — the famed punk rock/New Wave mecca in the Bowery, which was home base for the Ramones, Blondie, and the Talking Heads to name just a few.
J&P’s is no slouch in the live performance department, however, and can boast that artists ranging from Odetta, to George Thorogood, to Penn and Teller, to Nora Jones to Low Cut Connie to Ween have graced the venue’s minimalist stage.
“Still Drinkin’ & Smokin’” is broken down into three parts, or “Generations,” with some of the earliest chapters (1972-1992) describing the venue’s evolution from a little breakfast nook called John’s Place, to a folk and jazz destination, as well as a magnet for blues acts and aficionados. It was Larsen’s business partner Peter Price, who had left his career as a producer at WGN television in Chicago, who really launched the blues scene at J&P’s.
New Hope is so close to New York, curious musicians such as Paul Simon would make the drive and visit the tiny club and would be treated like a regular. Famed jazz saxophonist Phil Woods and his wife Chan Parker (saxophonist Charlie Parker’s widow) were sometimes in the audience, especially if Trenton sax man Richie Cole was playing.
Sometime in the early 1970s, folk legend Odetta gave a remarkable performance with some odd stipulations: no drinking, no smoking, absolutely no distractions.
The chapters about 1992-2012 take a look at the era where organized events like music jam The Invitational took flight, as well the North by New Hope festival. Some of the wilder parties are recalled in all their crazy, sweaty detail.
There are so very many local and regional musicians telling their stories, or being mentioned, it would be difficult to name them all. The book gives an idea of how much talent there is in the area.
It was also during this era at J&P’s where eclectic New Hope-based band Ween drew capacity crowds, and then some.
“When Ween played there, people crowded outside, in the street, in the parking lot,” Wuelfing says. “They were already so well known. They would try to play secret gigs, but there are no secrets in New Hope.”
Something else that makes John & Peter’s so unusual is its size: capacity is only 60 people, and no seat is further than 13 feet from the stage.
“As a band member, you can hear everything people are saying, and that includes things that are not complimentary,” the author says. “There’s no hiding if you’re a performer, so you really have to have your act together.”
Wuelfing, a native and resident of Morrisville, Pennsylvania, fell in love with oral histories after reading the Edie Sedgewick biography, “Edie: American Girl,” by Jean Stein. Then she read “Please Kill Me: The Uncensored Oral History of Punk” by Legs McNeil and was hooked.
“Jean Stein is considered the person who pioneered oral narrative/history, and once I read that book, I understood how to tell a story that way, and to me, it’s the ultimate way,” Wuelfing says. “Reading or hearing conflicting accounts of things is interesting, and my book ‘No Slam Dancing’ told stories in wildly different ways.”
“The writer is not making editorial decisions on who is telling the truth,” she says. “The reader hears different people’s voices and then is left to make the decision on what is true. When I took on the project of writing ‘No Slam Dancing’ about City Gardens, I knew that I wanted it to be an oral history.”
“I have a day job in the marketing department at Tabula Rasa HealthCare in Moorestown, but writing and publishing books is really my passion,” Wuelfing says. “I love helping people tell their stories.”
Writers and reporters know that one interview is challenging enough, but for “Still Drinkin’ & Smokin,’” Wuelfing, Titusville resident Arkuszewski, and Hunt, a Trenton native now living in Doylestown, talked to a myriad of folks who had worked or performed or simply hung out at John & Peter’s.
“Joan (Arkuszewski) helped a lot with the first section, especially tracking people down,” Wuelfing says. “Lauren (Hunt) helped do a lot of the interview editing, and then the final section (2013-2023) was mine. There are many moving parts to a book, especially with an oral history, so my co-authors pitched in, helped out and made the process go more quickly.”
She remarks that people who worked at or frequented John & Peter’s are aging, getting ill, and even dying, and this gave urgency to completing the project.
“That’s the thing with an oral history like ‘No Slam Dancing,’ so many of those people are gone now,” Wuelfing says. “I wanted to get this book done while John and Peter were both still alive. Peter did one or two interviews before he died (in March 2023). John did countless interviews, and sadly, just died this fall.”
Wuelfing was raised in a non-musical family by a single mom, a nurse who subscribed to the free-range style of parenting, the author says. Wuelfing says she always liked music, but when punk rock exploded in the mid-70s, she was smitten.
She vowed that, as soon as she got her driver’s license, she would point the car in the direction of New York City and hit the clubs. Meanwhile, just across the bridge in Trenton, City Gardens could give her a proper education in the punk and hardcore scene.
Wuelfing began her writing career penning interviews and publishing the seminal “Hard Times” ’zine in the 1980s. She graduated from Temple University in 1996 with a BA in political science. She is married to musician and music publicist Howard Wuelfing, and the couple has a son, Severin, a daughter-in-law Yenny, and a 5-year old grandchild, Lucas.
“Still Drinkin’ & Smokin’” also covers the important story of how, in 2018, Larsen sold John & Peter’s to Kevin Rauch, Mike Wieners and Chris Williams — three local guys who had worked there. However, right when they were really starting to gel as new owners, COVID hit and the venue had to close down. Fortunately, they and John &Peter’s survived.
“Things have worked out very well for them,” Wuelfing says. “They’re very shrewd, paid off the business, and now they have the building too, and that’s so important. That’s how some bars and places go out of business — landlords raise the rent and then it’s too expensive to stay. John and Peter sold it to the guys who had worked there, so it’s employee-owned.”
Wuelfing muses that there’s an anthropological aspect to capturing the stories of John & Peter’s. Such bars are a dying breed due to gentrification, homogenization, and corporate ways of running a venue, for example lining the walls with big-screen TVs tuned to sports.
She says in Amsterdam, the Dutch refer to bars like John & Peter’s as “brown bars,” supposedly because the walls are covered with cigarette residue.
“They’re losing them over there, too, but there’s a movement to save them,” Wuelfing says. “I think there should be a movement here, to save places like John & Peter’s, which has a certain cultural significance.”
“It’s like a home away from home — you can go there alone and people approach you, but not in a creepy way,” she says. “It’s a friendly, communal place, people look out for each other.”
“At the bar, you’d have bikers and drag queens and bankers all sitting next to each other,” Wuelfing says. “John started this 50 years ago, and his spirit of acceptance and community is still present there. Whatever you are is fine, just don’t be a jerk!”
Amy Wuelfing will be at Randy Now’s Man Cave, 119 West Ward Street, Hightstown, Saturday, December 16, from 4 to 6 p.m., with her book “Still Drinkin’ & Smokin,’ Still Rockin’ & Rollin:’ An Oral History of New Hope’s John & Peter’s” (DiWulf Publishing), co-authored with Joan Arkuszewski and Loren Hunt.
Authors Peter Genovese, Rich Scannella, and Cammie Sussman will also be on hand with their books. 609 424-3766. The Man Cave on the Web: www.mancavenj.com. DiWulf Publishing on the web: www.diwulf.com.
