News

Joe's Café: A love-hate relationship revealed in letters

NEWS REAL, APRIL 24, 2008

JOe's has Left and gone away

Good riddance: Thank God! I live down the block from Joe's and have patiently waited for this place to close down ["Say It Ain't So, Joe's," Keegan Hamilton]. I'm sure that it was a great hangout, and the atmosphere was certainly unique and cool. However, to be a resident living down the street from it was a nightmare! People walking through your lawn carrying cases of beer and drunk chicks screeching at the top of their lungs. Not cool. Some even went so far as to park their butts on our apartment building's front stairs and continue the drinking party until the wee morning hours. Awesome stuff to have to try to sleep through every Thursday night! It sucks for such a place to become overrun with idiots who can't hold their liquor and who have no respect for a sleeping neighborhood. Maybe Bill Christman should consider moving his bar a few blocks away to Delmar, where such a place would have a proper home.
Jessica B., via the Internet

For The Love of Joe's: God, how I loved this place. I first heard of it four years ago through a friend who worked with a relative of Bill's. I still remember our first night — it felt like walking into a neighborhood picnic. There was a potluck dinner at the time, families and people of all ages and, of course, wonderful music. The atmosphere was just perfect, and almost every time I went thereafter, I would eventually declare to my friends: "This is one of the greatest places in all of St. Louis."

I haven't been since last fall, because Joe's was always a warm-weather hangout for my group of friends. And since we would go just about every week during the summer, it helped to have a break during the winter months to avoid burnout. As it happens, I was just talking to a friend on Monday about how we needed to go to Joe's soon, now that the weather's nice. Bummer.
Hugh, via the Internet

MUSIC, MARCH 20, 2008

Dora Is Sorely Missed

But her voice lives on: Thanks, Ian Froeb, for painting the picture of Dora Magrath in "Amazing Grace." She was obviously a beautiful girl who, sadly, left the world too soon. She reminds me so much of my sister Julia, who lost her ten-year battle with depression at the age of 26. However, your headline tells it all; you can still hear Dora's voice. Please don't let this be the end of her story. With her father's statement about Missouri's "disgraceful" mental health care system, you have opened the door to help thousands of children, adolescents and adults deal with their own depression. The Coalition for Mental Health is the only group in Missouri raising money to fund research of early-onset mood disorders and suicide prevention programs for children and young adults.
Jan Waters, St. Louis