Black Cat Bar

Black Cat Bar
The exterior of the Black Cat. Image courtesy of the San Francisco History Center, San Francisco Public Library
Restaurant information
Established	1906, 1933
Street address	710 Montgomery St
City	San Francisco
State	California
Country	United States

Coordinates: 37°47′45″N 122°24′12″W / 37.795818°N 122.403257°W / 37.795818; -122.403257

The Black Cat Bar or Black Cat Café was a bar in San Francisco, California. It originally opened in 1906 and closed in 1921. The Black Cat re-opened in 1933 and operated for another 30 years. During its second run of operation, it was a hangout for Beats and bohemians but over time began attracting more and more of a gay clientele.

Because it catered to gay people, the bar became a flashpoint for the nascent homophile movement. The Black Cat was at the center of a legal fight that was one of the earliest court cases to establish legal protections for gay people in the United States. Despite this victory, continued pressure from law enforcement agencies eventually forced the bar's closure in 1964.

The Black Cat opened in 1906, shortly after the 1906 San Francisco earthquake. In the early years, the bar was located in the basement of the Athens Hotel at 56 Mason Street in San Francisco's Tenderloin neighborhood. This building still stands today and is now the Bristol Hotel. When entrepreneur Charles Ridley acquired the bar in 1911, he turned it into a showplace for vaudeville-style acts. Over the next several years, Ridley and the Black Cat came under increased police scrutiny as a possible center of prostitution. In 1921, the bar lost its dance permit and closed down.