Harbor restaurant owner denies sign barred 'fags' and 'coloreds'

[davidinalameda]

http://www.washblade.com/thelatest/thelatest.cfm?blog_id=6985

The owner of a restaurant near the Chesapeake Bay in Maryland says an unidentified prankster altered a sign outside the restaurant's entrance earlier this month in a way that made it appear to prohibit gays and blacks from entering its premises.



The Happy Harbor Inn apparently edited a sign outside its Deale, Md., location, but the meaning is still visible.
But two people who reported seeing the sign on May 2 said it had all the markings of a professionally prepared sign, with uniformly painted letters saying, "ATTENTION BIKERS: NO COLOREDS, FAGS, CLUB ATTIRE, (no) EXCEPTIONS."

While the origin of the words "fag" and "coloreds" on the sign is in dispute, everyone agrees that the sign has been displayed for some time next to the main entrance of the Happy Harbor Inn, a popular dockside restaurant in the Southern Maryland town of Deale.

On May 20, nearly three weeks after the two visitors reported seeing the words "coloreds" and "fags," the sign had been changed. A visit to the restaurant by a Washington Blade reporter showed that the letters "eds" and "f" appeared to have been covered by white paint, with a faint outline of the letters still visible.

[greyl]

1. I'm siding with the restaurant at this point.

(other than the fact that evidence of the vandalism should be totally eliminated.
It's clear from the photo that the sign was directed to bikers.

The article doesn't say it took 3 weeks for the restaurant to change the sign.

[Laughing Mirror]

2. "Attention Bikers! No Colors, No Rags, No Club Attire, No Exceptions."

Barbara Sturgell posted the sign on the door of the Happy Harbor Inn in Deale four years ago after a fight between Hells Angels and Pagans ended in a cloud of pepper spray and bullets.

The 72-year-old business owner broke down and cried yesterday as she wondered why someone had altered the sign on the door by painting out certain letters and adding others to discourage black and gay patrons.

"I have no idea who would mess with my sign. I can't believe that someone would be that vicious," said Sturgell, who has run the inn for 30 years.

Ted Harris, an African American who has frequented the restaurant since the 1960s, doesn't hold Sturgell blameless. He and a friend spotted the altered sign on the door during a visit May 3. "It was all in the same ink. It was professionally done," he said. ". . . When we came back, it was painted over, but you still could see the 'E-D-S' from the word 'colored.' "

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/05/23/AR2006052301649.html

[Dunvegan]

3. Here's the sign: We Report...You Decide.

[Solo_in_MD]

6. I've eaten there

and remeber the sign, since I also ride. I back the resturant as well. Decent food and nice people.

[smtpgirl]

7. I have been to the Happy Harbor

in fact, my realitives live in Deale. The place is cool, some of the locals are redneck, but never had a problem there.

Crabs are cheap and good

BUUUTT

Anne Arundel County is red, you make the call

[thrift_store_angel]

8. I live in this area,

and I am a moderator on the "internet message board" mentioned in one of the articles.

http://www.washblade.com/thelatest/thelatest.cfm?blog_id=7100

"A gay employee at the Happy Harbor Inn, who asked not to be identified because he is applying for another job where he cannot reveal his sexual orientation, said he noticed the sign had been changed during his shift on April 30 or 31, and brought the matter to the attention of a manager.

The employee said that because the restaurant was “very busy” from an influx of charter boat customers, the management did not get a chance to remove the offensive words “coloreds” and “fags” for four or five days. Sturgell said she had employees remove the letters “f” and “eds” from the sign as soon as an employee brought it to her attention.

The gay employee said his fellow employees know he’s gay, including the management, and no one has made him feel uncomfortable. He said most of the kitchen staff of the restaurant is African American, and that many of the customers also are African American."
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Exactly what they say happened in this article is what happened. I know the employee mentioned.

[Dunvegan]

4. The restaurant owner seems distressed. And one Black patron...

...says he's been coming to the establishment for years.

Hmmm...doesn't seem like the older lady is trying to create a situation, or she probably wouldn't feel so terrible, and the Black fellow wouldn't have been frequenting the place for so long.

Looks like a good sign painter interfered with bad intentions, from all we can see.

[triakis36]

5. I'm also siding w/ the restaurant here...

Looking at the sign as a whole, unless "club attire" can be considered a noun describing a distinct group of people, the sign wouldn't make any sense.

And so what if it was only 3 weeks.. it wasn't exactly reported to the owners attention right away. The article also quotes patrons having walked past the sign not noticing that it was changed.