Workin’ Girls
It was the most relaxed work environment I’ve ever experienced and we always had a blast together.
It was the most relaxed work environment I’ve ever experienced and we always had a blast together.
Speakeasy was conceived around March of 1994. The main impetus was that while the Internet was fascinating to me, I found the necessity of access only at home to be both socially debilitating and much too slow.
I first met Mike and Gretchen when I was 18 and came in to the Cafe via my volunteer work with TheFoundry, which was Speakeasy’s technology education venture.
I had always been a super-fan, lived in Ballard, came to Belltown all the time, used the terminals, very tech-savvy and tech-happy.
At the young age of 15 I attended an alternative school by the name of Puget Sound Community School (PSCS). I had the wonderful opportunity of visiting the Speakeasy Cafe on a regular basis and attend various classes hosted there.
One of the ways that Speakeasy connected with the arts community in Seattle was to provide a space for smaller production companies to screen films.
The cafe was featured in a piece by Der Spiegel in June of 1996.
I asked to talk to the manager and this short, attractive, direct woman in cutoff jeans and a white v-necked t-shirt came out and asked me a few questions. I think I answered them.
Speakeasy was the focus of an article by the Christian Science Monitor in May 1996.