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Ruby's Rocks!
A Sober History of the Northshore’s Premier Roadhouse

by Webb Williams

Ruby’s Roadhouse is one of those unique saloons in America that, when they rock, they really rock! “I remember when Rockin’ Dopsie & the Zydeco Twisters had the place jumpin’ so much that one of the support timbers under the bar busted and we couldn’t stand up behind the bar with all the bouncing,” recalls owner Fred Holland. “We had to have the piers shored up so it didn’t collapse.” Fred and his wife Diane, both Mandeville natives, have operated the joint since 1984, when they acquired the business from Eddie Deano, Patrick Clanton and John Preble. The place has always had a lot of character—and characters.

Preble the visionary

John Preble is as wonderfully zany and eccentric as his creation, the UCM Museum in Abita Springs. “I’m changin’ the name to the Abita Mystery House,” he corrects. It’s the showplace of wackiest exhibits. Like Buford, the 24-foot Bassigator, the world’s only 32-foot alligator—an alligator sculpture with 32 feet, wearing 32 shoes! John Preble is an artist. In 1982, he and his dear wife, Ann, were realtors. Their friend, Eddie Deano Jr., told John that he’d like to own a barroom.

“About a week later, I spotted a little For Sale sign in front of a ramshackle bar called ‘Mabel’s Brown Derby’ on Highway 190 (Florida St.) and Lamarque St. I went in and the place was pitch black in mid-afternoon. There was a guy shootin’ pool in the back where the only light seemed to be. A sign on the wall said ‘No Obscene Language.’ I asked to speak to the owner, and he kicked a mattress on the floor and woke Miss Mabel. She said it was okay—it was time for her to get up anyway.

“There were always lots of cars out front, but only a couple of people in the bar. It turns out there was the hottest poker game in Mandeville going on in the back building.” Mabel and her lady partner reportedly got a good share of the pots. It didn’t matter if you were black or white—as long as your money was green—you were welcome to play. The women owners had made a fortune and were ready to take the money and run.” John adds, excitedly, “We bought the place in 1982 for just $23,000. They even owner-financed it, so we got in for $1,000!”

Preble and Deano figure the place was built in the ’20s. Preble renovated it and was happy to have a showcase for Bobby Lounge to play barrelhouse piano and sing. (Preble was and still is Lounge’s agent and friend.) They needed someone to manage and operate the bar, so another friend, redheaded Patrick Clanton was a natural choice. Gregarious and friendly, he always wore a ruby ring, and the nickname “Ruby” stuck.

Ruby’s Rendezvous was born. “Rendezvous” came from where John Preble first saw Ike and Tina Turner at a place in New Iberia in the ’70s called Leo’s Rendezvous. “It was the spittin’ image of Ruby’s—the name and the vibe fit,” John smiles. Palm trees, white tablecloths, a stage in the back right corner, a pink ceiling and black walls “made the place look really elegant. Like Tipitina’s, y’know?” John quips, exposing his interesting sense of elegance. Eddie Deano bought the ornate bar and mirrors from an entrance bar at the old St. Charles Hotel in New Orleans. Eddie said lots of patrons have recognized it and welcomed it to Mandeville.

Talented live musical acts spanning the spectrum of styles are the norm now at Ruby’s. “Bobby Lounge is gonna’ break nationally soon,” Preble says, putting on his promoter hat. “We’ve got deals in the works—you’ll see him on Letterman and Leno.” Lounge is gaining in popularity; his style is kind of like an excitable Jerry Lee Lewis playing barrelhouse piano like James Booker. “Funny thing about it is, he played at Ruby’s Rendezvous three or four times in ’82 and ’83, then took sick with chronic fatigue syndrome for decades, then recovered, played a coupla’ years ago at Jazz Fest, was a big, big hit. When Rolling Stone magazine asked him where he’d been playin’, he proudly said, ‘Ruby’s Rendezvous in Mandeville, Louisiana!’”

Eddie, Ruby and
All That Jazz

Eddie Deano made the business proposition to Patrick “Ruby” Clanton to bring back Dixieland jazz to the northshore. Opening night was May 28, 1982, heralded by a friend who hired a plane to fly around St. Tammany with a banner that read “Grand Opening Tonight Hwy. 190” and everybody knew what it was all about. “You couldn’t park up and down the highway for blocks, and we had to turn people away at the door. I think I got home at five the next morning and I was totally exhausted,” Ruby recalls.

In Ruby’s Rendezvous’ first two years, New Orleans jazz was the predominant music, with Andrew Hall’s Society Brass Band as one of the joint’s regulars. Ruby remembers that even the “Kids” played Ruby’s—Kid Ory and Kid Thomas. “But Thomas was anything but a kid. Must’ve been in his ’80’s. He came hungry, so we got him a sandwich. Then he was thirsty, so we got him a beer. Then he had to go to the bathroom … anyway, I felt like a babysitter instead of a bar manager.”

Danny Barker played Ruby’s, too, but not all acts were Dixieland. Ruby remembers, “We had the Red Beans & Rice Revue—a big Southwest Louisiana Cajun band—and we had Mandeville’s own homegrown Radiators on Thursdays. They packed the place and you could hear ’em a few blocks away.” Other greats that Ruby notes as regulars were Spencer Bohren, Mighty Sam McClain and John Mooney. Deano says he’s still kickin’ himself for not listening to a demo tape of then up-and-comer Sonny Landreth.

Ruby got a brainstorm that paid off big. He figured that since waiters, waitresses, cooks, and bartenders worked Fridays and Saturdays, he’d book bands to play afternoon and early evenings on Sundays, their off days. It was a major success for the business. “The music brought everyone together. It was a comfortable place to have a drink, and folks from all walks of life left their troubles at the door and had a good time,” Ruby remembers. “In the first two years Eddie and I ran it, there was only one fight, and it was so minor a scuffle that Eddie’s wife broke it up!”

Fred and Dianne
Take Over

Fred Holland acquired the business in 1984. “Before it was Mabel’s Brown Derby, it was Buck’s Brown Derby,” he offers, giving even more insight into the building’s storied history. “And there were rocking chairs chained up on the front porch. Old-timers recalled kids crawlin’ under the porch to fetch change that fell out of pockets,” Fred chuckles.

“Before I met Dianne I actually lived here at the bar,” Fred recalls. “In fact, I got the pool table ’cause I was tired of sleepin’ on the floor!” Fred changed the name to Ruby’s Roadhouse, “because ‘Al’s Rendezvous’ opened across the street.” The music inside changed a bit, too. “The Dixieland jazz thing wasn’t as popular with our regulars, so we began experimenting. The Radiators still played to a packed house on occasion. When they played, I was set for two or three months. But once, for some stupid reason, I hired a glitter rock band with the smoke machine and all,” Fred laughs, remembering the debacle. “We had two customers the whole night!” That was a painful lesson.”

In the mid- to late-’80’s there was a bluesy-folksy mood when a lot of Southern bands sounded like the Byrds. Those acts helped with Fred’s cash flow by playing on Sundays. But nobody ever packed the house quite like the Radiators. “We had old beer boxes with ice and we’d run out of beer—had to send Ed Parker to the store—so we were unfortunately known for the warmest beer in town in those days.”

Managing the Masses

As I talked with Fred, I noted that in the 24 years I’ve been a regular customer I’ve only seen one or two minor altercations—both busted up by on-the-ball bouncers. “We don’t like to call ’em ‘bouncers’ as such,” Fred says. “Workers. We’ve added bi-lingual workers since there are so many Latino workers in the area. We just want everybody on the same page at Ruby’s. The idea is to have a good time.” I mentioned one ‘worker’ with only one arm who was there for years. “Yeah, one-armed Bob,” offers Fred. “He was good.”

“We’ve got a good relationship with the police,” Dianne adds. “They’ll come by around closing and that gives us a secure feeling.” Fred and Dianne have a vendor outside on band nights who sells Nathan’s Hot Dogs with chili, kraut, onions and the works; tamales and other goodies. Now even the cops stop by for a bite.

Way Back When

Dianne tells of the yuppies discovering Ruby’s Roadhouse. “It was around 1991, and it was great. We breathed easier, and I even quit my day job. Video Poker came along. At first, we didn’t want gambling in the bar, but our accountant showed us why we should. It was a boon while it lasted.”

Fred says there was a whole wall of slot machines at the bar in the 1950s, when Miss Mabel still ruled. Dianne adds, “They had a service window for the white folks that would come by outside and get a drink.” I asked if they weren’t welcome inside and Fred replied, “Back then, if you were a white kid—18, 19, 20—you had to prove yourself by going inside. Miss Mabel sat you at the bar and kept an eye on you and made sure nobody beat you up. You’d have one drink, leave, and you were a man.

“I remember as a kid there was a big ole oak tree near the highway, and both blacks and whites would get booze out that window and go sit under that tree and slosh it down,” Fred says. “People did a lot of ‘tree drinkin’ back then.”

Favorite Place,
Favorite Players

I told Fred that musician friends of mine who’ve played in the states and abroad, like Big Daddy ‘O,’ J. Monque ’D Blues Band, The Boogiemen, and Christian Serpas & Ghost Town, say that Ruby’s is their favorite place to play, for many reasons. Fred opines, “I think it’s accidentally on purpose the way John Preble did the walls. The stage and the acoustics are as rich as you can get. And it’s not too big or too little, so musicians like the place a lot. Good crowd contact.”

The most memorable acts? “The Radiators,” Fred says without hesitation. “Because they’re so good and because I owe ’em a lot for helpin’ us get started. Lots of Delta Blues players, too.” Dianne adds, “The Dixie Chicks played Ruby’s before they became famous, and Maria Muldaur.”

Fred recalls his fondest musical memory at Ruby’s. “Gatemouth Brown was playin’ his fiddle and he and the sax player were doin’ a call-and-response bluesy kinda’ thing. They were mimicking each other, and he was so good he could make that fiddle sound like any instrument in the world. It was just incredible what they were doin’—goin’ back and forth. [It was] a most memorable five to six minutes that will always stick in my mind.”

Fred singled out Big Daddy ‘O’, Owen Tufts, as being a special performer now. “He’s really gotten to be a good friend over the years—a special guy for us on Thursdays, Fridays, Saturdays, or Sundays. His love of music and his good vibes communicate to the crowds.”

Even movie stars find their way to Ruby’s. “Steven Segal was in town scouting a movie not too long ago and was supposed to have a private party at Ruby’s, but the word got out,” says Fred. “He played guitar for a while and had to leave ’cause he wasn’t feelin’ good. Turns out he just got back from Romania with a touch of pneumonia.” I suggested that there was a blues song in that phrase somewhere, and Fred agreed.

Dianne says that Axel Rose stopped in for a while once, Wayne Toups shot a video at the bar and Tab Benoit was a major hit. She laughs when she recalls a Buddhist Lama who ordered an Abita Amber. “He said having only a few was not excessive.”

Romance at Ruby’s

Thousands of couples have hooked up at Ruby’s through the years, with many pairings resulting in wedlock. My oldest daughter, Sheila, and I were enjoying the band one night when a lad was smitten with her. He courted her and they married last year. Other happy marriages that first were fueled at Ruby’s include Becky Deano, Eddie’s sister. She spotted her guy coming out of the men’s room, grabbed him by the hand, dragged him onto the dance floor, and she and Jay have been happily married now for 23 years.

Fred says that many couples write their names on the ceilings, walls, and doors and revisit their graffiti—but a few split-ups through the years have resulted in erasures, too. Dianne discourages weddings at the bar; there have been only a few. But there’ve been scores of wedding receptions, including a post-wedding-reception party when IN’s managing editor Stacey Paretti Rase and her husband, Mike, were married.

Good Vibes and
Hard Work

“Everything we’ve got is because of our customers,” says Fred. “All we do is open the doors. You guys are the ones that show up and make it happen. We’ve met so many wonderful people, thanks to Ruby’s Roadhouse.”

Yeah, right. I know they work their butts off to make Ruby’s rock. Just look at how quickly they got back on their feet following last year’s hurricane. “We got the bar open again two weeks after Katrina. Had to cut through the trees on the roads, but the bar was unscathed,” Fred laughs. “The theory around town was that Ruby’s has so many holes and cracks in the old joint that the hurricane just blew through it!”

I think what really happened was that the good vibes of our local pride and joy, Ruby’s Roadhouse, just blew Katrina away.