Bibliofemme News
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20/07/2004
Bars brawl over which was Hemingway's true local
A BAR-ROOM dispute involving Ernest Hemingway, Key West's most famous literary son, has descended into a legal wrangle, 43 years after the author's death.
The owners of two of the island's most prominent bars are at odds over which is the original "Sloppy Joe's", the reputed favourite watering hole of the Nobel Prize-winning writer during the 12 years he lived in Florida.
Sloppy Joe's Bar has filed a trademark infringement lawsuit against the owners of the neighbouring Captain Tony's Saloon, demanding that they cease describing their pub as the original.
The first Sloppy Joe's opened in a former morgue on the site now occupied by Captain Tony's in 1933, and it counted Hemingway among its customers. He is said to have bankrolled "Sloppy" Joe Russell's move to the current location in 1937.
Hemingway, who won the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1954, committed suicide in 1961 but is still the top tourist draw in the Florida Keys.
"It's sad that it's come to a lawsuit," said Jimmy Weekley, the mayor of Key West. "In Hemingway's day it would have been settled over a beer."
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