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The Red Hat is going away

Boston Restaurant Talk reports the Red Hat on Bowdoin Street, which opened in 1907, is closing for good in a few days. It joins a series of other Boston watering-hole andmarks, including Durgin-Park, Jacob Wirth and Doyle's, that have shut in recent years.

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Comments

This is what happens when you creat a blurb on your phone and it thinks it's smarter than you. Thanks, fixed.

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A tip of the red hat.

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Say it ain't so! My parents frequented the Red Hat in the 70's when they worked at the JFK building...then it became my haunt when I worked in the West End during college.

This is a real shame to hear.

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I’ll miss the 10 cent wings

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I will miss it too :(

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And kamikaze pitchers.

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While I am sad to see institutions go... I have to beg the question, what was holding these places afloat. Just nostalgia and tourism?

Sure the restaurant industry took a nosedive last year but many adapted.

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Do they own the property that they occupy, I wonder? Or did they negotiate really sweet 20-year leases and have been paying below-market rents for years?

Cost of occupancy is not the whole story in these businesses, but it is a key factor in every restaurant that thrives or fails spectacularly (pandemic aside).

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At least when I was in college the under 21 crowd seemingly kept this place afloat. No students in nearby dorms probably didn’t help this past 16 months.

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law firm there. The place was frequently packed with State House, Government Center and Suffolk U employees.

Remote work likely hurt them, as it has many Downtown and FiDi joints that rely on weekday breakfast, catering, lunchtime and after-work trade.

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I can only keep my memories of my heyday there to myself!

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Is McGann's added to that list?

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Great little place in an area overrun by posh chain-ey establishments. Discovered it while working at Mass General and loved it ever since.

Adam, feel feel to post a story, headlined, "Every bar Former Westroxer ever drank at to close."

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In 2019. Nice regular fans and cute af staff.

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If someone ever gets a Museum of 20th Century Boston going (On the right is the electric chair which killed Sacco and Vanzetti though the government's case was flawed, Over here on the left are shattered school bus windows from Southie Maggots throwing rocks at black kids....), that blender needs to be enshrined somewhere in there.

The thing about the Red Hat closing, it reminds you that government employees haven't returned to work in a lot of places, whilst us private sector ones have been hauling into town for months. I have been going in three days a week in September, sometimes more, sometimes less.

Time for some HR reviews at One Ashburton and 100 Cambridge Street to see how vital you are to the cause State Rep's nephew.

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think people who prefer it are necessarily any less valuable to their organizations. Showing up in person is great if the job demands it and that works for you and your management -- I and many of my colleagues have been in hybrid mode since we got fully vaccinated -- but for many roles, it will not be essential.

Further, I think companies that insist that their workers show up in person every day when it's questionable how essential that is for their jobs are going to find themselves struggling to fill positions. The pandemic proved that for many roles, productivity isn't tied to location. (In my case, not commuting 90 minutes a day gives my company hours of more effective work every week.)

And consider what remote work means to parents or caregivers to elders that struggle to find or afford daycare, or to folks that care deeply about the environmental impact of long car commutes. Then there's the stress reduction of driving less often amidst a churning sea of aggressive Massholes. (Spoken as a former member of the tribe that eventually achieved lower blood pressure through more courteous driving, a tough slog to unlearn long-bred instincts.)

Myself, I never did and still don't want to work from my damned dining room all the time. I like seeing my colleagues outside of Zoom calls, and find in-person teamwork more efficient *some of the time*. (My lunch options are much better a short distance from work than home, too, a huge plus in my book.) But I doubt my company will ever return to "everyone in the office five days a week" model.

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We, sometimes, went there after work when I was working on Staniford Street. It will be missed.

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Was always busy before Bruin’s games

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