This is the story of 23 North Sixth Street at Hennepin Ave., in Downtown Minneapolis.  The building wasn’t known for any one major music venue, but several have lived there through its long life.  I had to choose one for the title, so I chose the most colorful, even though the Vanity Dance Hall may have only been here for a couple of weeks.

Other venues were:

• The Modern Dancing School
• The King of Clubs (not the one in Northeast)
• La Casa Coronado
• And a host of restaurants and bars after my 1974 cutoff, including Chicago, Take Five, Cheers, Tobie’s, and Reilly’s.

The building was built in 1905 at a cost of $20,000 as a warehouse and store.

THE MODERN DANCING SCHOOL

This dancing school hired 30 women to give dance lessons to men, six for $6.  The first ad, in the classifieds, appeared on January 1, 1924.  Dances taught included the Valencia, the Black Bottom, and the Blues.  Dances were accompanied by a live orchestra.  By February the lady count was up to 70, and the ad read, “Age no obstacle.”  In April 1924, the Tango was added to the list of dances taught.  In 1926 the ad promised an easy method:  “no embarrassment.”  But that was November 7, 1926, the last ad.

One problem with this was that it was under scrutiny from the Women’s Co-operative Alliance, who thought it looked suspiciously like a taxi-dance joint.  These proper ladies may have convinced the City Council not to renew R.J. Brewer’s dance hall license.

These ladies were also after S.D. “Dancing Dan” Stocking at his places at 242 Nicollet and 703 Hennepin, but he went on to teach dancing until 1984.

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VANITY DANCE HALL

The next great venue at this address may have lasted only a couple of weeks, but it had a great name!  The Vanity Dance Hall opened on December 14, 1946.

 

 

After that, six identical ads to the one below were placed until December 31, 1946.

 

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KING OF CLUBS

Not much was found about the King of Clubs, except what was in the few ads placed in the papers.  Entertaining was Obie Sailin’s Well Known Swingsters.

 

The last ad wasn’t far behind the first.  Here we learn that the manager was Reuben Olson, and that Obie had something to do with WDGY radio.

 

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LA CASA CORONADO

The next we see this address as a venue is as a hurried location of La Casa Coronado, after their last location suffered a fire.  The famous Mexican restaurant had this address from April 1965 to 1979.  See that story on their page.

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As mentioned above, the space hosted a number of restaurants before the building was demolished some time after 1996.  In 2001 the whole block became a hotel, with the address 601 First Street.  Let’s hope there’s a place to dance.