The frame building at 6615 Roosevelt Road was a roadhouse, hunting lodge and sporting-team headquarters until 1925, then a run of nightclubs. The best known was The Hunt Club, where Lil Armstrong, Turk Murphy and Bob Scobey played through the '50s and early '60s, and after that came the Deer Lodge, complete with pool tables and a fortune teller. The FitzGerald family bought it in 1980 and built a national reputation for roots, blues, jazz and Americana in a room that never got fancy. In March 2020, Chicago venue veteran Will Duncan (Thalia Hall, Dusek's) took over without closing for a single day, kept the name and added energy. The compound now spans three buildings.
There's the historic nightclub, the corner FITZGERALDS Sidebar cocktail lounge and a patio stage that runs festivals like the American Music Festival and the fall fair. The best part is how much of it is free. Sunday nights bring Big Band & BBQ in the nightclub, Tuesdays host a songwriter circle in the Sidebar, and jazz trios and happy-hour bands fill the rest of the week, with dinner from Babygold Barbecue. Ticketed headliners run most weekends. Street parking is tight, so the club recommends rideshare, a bike or, in its words, a rickshaw.
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