McGlinchey’s Bar

Philadelphia’s Center City dive bar inventory is well stocked, a number of timeless institutions well distributed throughout the core of the city. On a one-time visit, McGlinchey’s Bar may not rise above the label of “the smoking bar,” but the history here runs deep, the building dating back to 1922 and many of the bar’s elements decades old.

The smoking reputation is accurate, of course, McGlinchey’s Bar allowed to host city smokers thanks to a quirk in Philadelphia’s smoking ban that allows bars with little reliance on food for income to operate under an exemption. To satisfy the requirement that food be offered without tipping into enough revenue to trigger the smoking ban’s enforcement, the menu here is slender and centered around notoriously inexpensive hot dogs.

But the story underneath the hot dog and smoking-allowed headline is a compelling one, dating back to 1937 with the building was sold to a man with the surname McGlinchey, first name not revealed by the few sources that have dared to recount the history of the Philadelphia dive bar. McGlinchey’s first foray into business involved setting up shop on the second floor of the building that today houses the bar, operating a restaurant as late as 1949. At some point during the 1950s, the business moved to the first floor and reimagined itself as a bar, taking over a space occupied by a business named The Odd Shop, a bookstore and curio store.