Hugh Hefner Letter

In 1960, Hefner expanded the magazine’s branding by opening the first Playboy Club in Chicago, with additional clubs opening in Miami and New Orleans in 1961. Addressing a William Phillips of Atlanta, Hefner complains in this newly acquired letter that his organization is being criticized due to the segregation of its New Orleans club—segregation in keeping with the prohibition of “interracial activities involving personal and social contacts” under a 1956 Jim Crow law. “It is really an ironic thing that we, who have such an excellent track record would be attacked to the point where it might jeopardize all of the good work we have done to date,” he writes, “and the good work that we most certainly intend to do in the future in the area of solving the problem of segregation.” Hefner points out that Playboy clubs in other cities admit members of all races, stating, “It honestly never occurred to us that we would be prevented by state or local laws from operating all our Clubs in this manner.” The letter goes on for three pages to outline the history of the New Orleans club’s early struggles to integrate as well as Playboy’s stance on racial equality. 

The New Orleans club was located at 727 Iberville Street, between Bourbon and Royal. Under the guidance of local saxophonist Al Belletto, who served as director of entertainment, it became known for the quality of its music, particularly modern—rather than traditional—jazz. Regular and guest performers included pianist Ellis Marsalis and trumpeter Dizzy Gillespie as well as young drummers Bruce Raeburn and Johnny Vidacovich, among many others. Ellis Marsalis, who played at the club six nights a week, later recalled that in the early 1960s, “the law didn’t allow us to play with white performers. We played downstairs, and then we backed up the black performers that came in.” The Civil Rights Act of 1964 allowed for the integration of both the club’s performers and its clientele, and the club remained open until 1974. Jazz historian Charles Suhor calls the club “a major force in the growth of modern jazz in New Orleans.”