Union Issues Write The Final Chapter
Hard times began for the Stork Club in 1956, when it lost money for the first time. In 1957, unions tried once again to organize the club's employees. Their major effort ten years before had been unsuccessful; at that time, Sherman Billingsley was accused of attempting to influence his employees to stay out of the union with lavish staff parties and financial gifts. By 1957, all other similar New York clubs except the Stork Club were now unionized. This met with resistance from Billingsley and many dependable employees left the Stork Club over his refusal to allow them to be represented by a union. Picket lines were set up and marched in front of the club daily for years, including the club's last day of business. The club received many threats connected to his refusal to accept unions for his workers; some of the threats involved Billingsley's family. In 1957, he was arrested for displaying a gun when some painters who were working at the Austrian Consulate next to the family's home sat on his stoop for lunch. Billingsley admitted to acting rashly because of the threats. Three months before his arrest, his secretary was assaulted as she was entering the building where she lived; her assailants made references to the union issues at the Stork Club.
Many of his patrons no longer visited the night spot as a result of the union dispute, and many of Billingsley's friendships, including those of Walter Winchell and J. Edgar Hoover, were broken. He began firing staff without good cause. As the dispute dragged on, there was also no longer a live band in the dining room for music. In 1963, the club that had never needed to advertise offered a hamburger and French fries for $1.99 in the New York Times; when those in the know about the club saw it, they realized the Stork Club's days were coming to an end. In the last few months of its operation, at times there were only three customers for the entire evening.
When the Stork Club initially closed its doors, news stories indicated it was being shut because the building it occupied had been sold and a new location was being sought. The years of labor disputes had taken their toll on Billingsley financially. Trying to keep the Stork Club going took all of his assets and about $10 million from his three daughters' trust funds. While in the hospital recuperating from a serious illness in October 1965, Billingsley sold the building to Columbia Broadcasting System (CBS), who turned the site into a park named after its founder's father. In a 1937 interview, Billingsley said, "I hope I'll be running a night club the last day I live." He fell just short of that mark. One year to the day after the closing of the Stork Club, Sherman Billingsley died of a heart attack at his Manhattan apartment, leaving a wife, Hazel, and three daughters, Jacqueline, Barbara, and Shermane.
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