Pat Fenton, right, with barman Mike O'Donnell at the retirement party last November for co-owner Jimmy Houlihan.
By Irish Echo Staff
“Of all the bars in the neighborhood my father might stop into, Farrell’s was the one he kept returning to until end of his life,” wrote Pete Hamill in his memoir “A Drinking Life.”
Hamill was once an altar boy a block away at Holy Name of Jesus Church, 245 Prospect Park West, and the basement there, Shepherd’s Hall, is the location this Saturday, beginning at 7 p.m., for the launch party/community celebration/fundraiser for “Why Farrell’s?”
The documentary features interviews with the newspaper editor and novelist Hamill, Congressman Peter King and writer Pat Fenton, who has penned a number of pieces for the Irish Echo on the story of Farrell’s, its neighborhood Windsor Terrace and Irish working-class history in Brooklyn.
Farrell’s has been doing business at the corner of 16th Street and 9th Avenue since 1933, a short time after Prohibition ended, and, though there were many other bars in Windsor Terrace, over time it came to symbolize the neighborhood itself. “Why Farrell’s? – The Story of a Small Town in a Big City” explains why.
Advance tickets, which include beer, wine and soda, are priced at $30 and will be $35 at the door; $250 for reserved table of 10. Details at the documentary's website here or 718-965-1777.
