Longtime Midtown bar announces it will close
Old Zinnie’s, otherwise known as Zinnie’s, announced its closing after 45 years as a stalwart in Midtown nightlife.
Though the owner, Bill Baker, could not immediately be reached for comment, a note taped to the front door of the bar broke the news.
Without giving an exact cause for its closure, the note bids a fond farewell to its customers for “some 45 years” of service.
Zinnie’s on 1688 Madison Ave. was known for its classic dive-bar ambiance and maintaining an old-Memphis feel among a Midtown landscape that is constantly changing.
A longtime hangout for musicians, journalists, college students, people with dirty clothes (the bar conveniently was located across the street from a laundry) and other Midtown habitués, Zinnie’s had few windows and a dark, wooden interior that inhibited excess sunlight.
It was a where-everybody-knowsyour-name-but-can-also-keep-a-secret kind of place, which made it an appropriate site for the memorial service for reporter and occasional elbowbender Chris Conley of The Commercial Appeal, who died in 2013.
For years, the bar boasted an impressive jukebox, but its musical talent was not confined to a machine: One longtime bartender was Sandra Jackson, a founding member of The Goodees, a Memphis “girl group” that recorded a memorable if minor hit, “Condition Red,” for a Stax subsidiary label in 1968.
Zinnie’s opened in 1973. A younger sister bar, Zinnie’s East, closed in 2011. The Commercial Appeal reporter John Beifuss contributed to this report.