Wonder Vue Cafe
The Wonder Vue Cafe was located at 1007 Sixth Ave. No.
THE BUILDING
There were actually two properties listed on the City’s permit card for 1001 – 1007 Sixth Street N.
One was a 48′ by 50′ frame building with two stores and two apartments, built for $5,000 in April 1913.
The other was of the same dimensions, but just a store building built for $2,000 in June 1913. Given the address, I suspect that 1007 was the latter building.
The first use of the building found was a dry goods store run by Benjamin Goldman, listed in the 1930 directory.
FRESNO CAFE
The Fresno cafe was at this address in 1937 and was owned by Joe and Emma Taylor. Whether it had music is unknown. On January 22, 1937, Joe was jailed when he shot a man over a broken beer glass. The story is that the man smashed a beer glass on the floor and Joe asked him and his party to be more careful. Belligerent, the man started to curse and threaten Joe with a bottle. Joe said to stop or he would shoot. He shot. What did not bode well was that Joe was black and that the dead man was white. Joe was tried for murder and found not guilty by a jury in March 1937.
In October 1938, an ad appeared in the Minneapolis papers offering a beer parlor for sale, cheap. It was described as being across from the Sumner project.
THE WONDER VUE CAFE
The Wonder Vue first appears in July 1940, although it may have been here earlier. Its proprietor was Leon Burnette, and it offered “First Class Entertainment.”
In December 1940 it advertised that it was under new management, which must have been Horace Nelson. An ad from June 1941 in the Minneapolis Spokesman called the Wunder Vue “A Place to Enjoy the Evening” – kind of a tepid endorsement but hey… The small ad did say that there was “Good Food – Entertainment.”
Horace ran into a string of bad luck. In August 1941 he was arrested for allowing gambling in his place. Then in October 1941 he was busted again, same charge plus selling liquor without a license (he probably only had a 3.2 beer license).
An interesting note is that in an article about a raid on the Clef Club, another hot spot on “The Avenue,” in 1942, it said that proprietor Horace George Davis had been convicted for selling liquor without a license at the Wonder Vue in 1941. Our same Horace? (Minneapolis Star, January 15, 1942)
HUB CAFE
By January 1942, the spot had become the Hub Cafe. And by April 1942 it was already under new management, with good music, entertainment. The Hub featured entertainment by Walter Lear and His Gents of Rhythm, Friday through Sunday in September 1942.
But in December 1942 the “alleged all night spot” was raided by state agents by order of Governor Harold E. Stassen. Mayor Kline agreed with the move, and said that his hands had been tied for lack of manpower because so many men from the police force had gone into the military. Ben Wilson, the “Mayor of the North Side,” was named as the proprietor of the Hub at the time of the raid. About 100 people were in the club at the time. (Minneapolis Star, December 28, 1942)
In the 1950 directory the address is listed to the Factory Surplus Mart.
The building was wrecked in January 1957.