April 16: Madam Polly Adler

Polly (Pearl) Adler, who ran New York’s best-known brothels during Prohibition and the 1930s under the “protection” of Dutch Schultz, was born in Yanow, Belorussia on this date in 1900. Sent to live in New York at the age of 12, she was cut off from her family by World War I and forced into sweatshop work. Raped by a foreman at one job, she endured an illegal abortion and slipped into the underworld of gangsters, speakeasies, and brothels. Adler was known as the “Queen of Tarts,” and her “castle” at The Majestic, 15 West 75th St. — built in 1924 and filled with alcoves, passages, and stairwells, perfect for hiding or fleeing — became a favorite hang-out for mobsters, Broadway stars, business men, politicians (including Mayor Jimmy Walker), and the writers of the Algonquin Round Table, including George S. Kaufman, Dorothy Parker, and Robert Benchley. (“The world knew Polly as a madam,” said Milton Berle, another customer, “but her friends knew her as an intelligent woman, fun to be with, and a good cook.”) Adler was arrested thirteen times but avoided conviction through bribery and sexual freebies until 1935, when she served 30 days. By then she had a chain of brothels in the city and a club in Saratoga Springs, but lived in perpetual fear of being caught up in mob violence. Adler dropped out of prostitution during World War II, retired to Los Angeles, gained a college degree, and lived off the sales of her ghost-written 1951 memoir, A House Is Not a Home.

“I am one of those people who just can’t help getting a kick out of life — even when it’s a kick in the teeth.” —Polly Adler