Tooker Alley

In the city of Chicago, from 1915 til about 1930, a complete cross section of early industrial America squeezed itself “through the hole in the wall, down Tooker Alley” in search of “the Green Lite over the Orange Door.” On that door was scrawled “Step High, Stoop Low, Leave Your Dignity Outside” and behind it lay a most peculiar institution—the Dil Pickle Club (yes, one “l”). Consciously nobrow, militantly inclusive and ceaselessly creative, the Dil Pickle Club eschewed any and all social, economic or cultural limitations. Inside its walls itinerant hobos, society mavens, literati, mobsters & molls, high-toned swells, anarchisti, wobblies, suffragettes, professors, dancers, jazz players, politicos, and everyone in between coalesced, communed and cavorted. They dubbed this social cross-pollination “Hobohemia.”