Flashback Friday: Wichita caught Saturday-night fever at this 1970s pick-up bar
.jpg "People would stand in long lines to get into Lettuce, a popular disco club that operated at Central and Waco in Wichita in the late 1970s and early 1980s. This photo was taken in 1979.")
Welcome to Flashback Friday, an occasional feature that runs Fridays on Kansas.com and Dining with Denise. It’s designed to take diners back in time to revisit restaurants and clubs that they once loved but that now live only in their memories — and in The Eagle’s archives.
This week’s featured business is among the most-remembered nightclubs in Wichita history.
Last weekend, a friend of mine threw herself a 70th birthday party, and as an ode to her seven decades of life, she asked people to “dress ’70s.”
I went the Mrs. Roper route, donning a colorful kaftan and a chunky turquoise-colored bracelet I’d scored at an estate sale. But when I saw what another guest chose to wear, I nearly hyperventilated.
It was a vintage 1970s satin jacket in emerald green, and embroidered on the back was the word “Lettuce.”
Even though I didn’t live in Wichita in the late 1970s/early 1980s — and even though I was in elementary school at that time — I was able to instantly identify this amazing artifact as having come from Lettuce, one of the most loved nightclubs to ever operate in Wichita.
Back when I was researching my 2021 book “Classic Restaurants of Wichita,” I took a deep dive into the history of Lettuce, which operated on the corner of Central and Waco from 1977 until the mid-1980s. I was fascinated by what I learned — in particular that Lettuce was the ultimate yuppie pick-up club, that it was famous for its three-for-one happy hour special, and that on weekend nights, people hoping to get in would stand in long lines that wrapped around the building.
That building, whose address was 458 N. Waco, is no longer there. But memories of Lettuce are still fresh in the memories of many locals. People who, like my birthday friend, turned 70 this year were the club’s target demographic.
The jacket owner at the party told me that he served as a bouncer at the club and that he’d saved the jacket all these years. He also wore a matching Lettuce ball cap.
And he wasn’t the only guest at the party representing Lettuce: Another man wore a white sun visor with the club’s cursive logo stitched across the front.
Those resurfaced relics sparked lots of conversations at the party about the glory days of Lettuce. (One conversation, in which I suggested to the Lettuce jacket owner that he should perhaps donate it to my Wichita restaurant relic collection, was shut down very quickly.)
According to Wichita Eagle archives, Lettuce opened in April of 1977 and was owned by Lee Aronfeld, who at the time was also the president of the LeMans chain of arcades. The club took over a building that was built in 1916 to house a grocery store.
At the time, Aronfeld told The Eagle that the name “Lettuce” not only tied the business back to the origins of its space but that it also was intended as a pun: “Let us entertain you.” He referred to the business as a “meeting and drinking establishment.”
The club, which played exclusively disco music, opened the same year that “Saturday Night Fever” was released, and regulars remember that John Travolta wannabes would boogie on the parallelogram-shaped dance floor, a disco ball spinning overhead.
As the 1980s dawned, the club became the type of place that would attract well-heeled singles between the ages of 21 and 30 — known as yuppies — who would drink and dance away the stresses of the week.
Lettuce had a dress code: Jeans were allowed only if they were “high fashion,” and the doormen made the final call. The club was a good place to pick up a date, too: Its matchbook covers were printed with blank spaces for name, address and phone number followed by the words “You met me at Lettuce.”
The club had 4,000 square feet, but the layout was long and narrow and included four levels of seating that cascaded on a diagonal to a 105-foot bar. At the time the club opened, its owner insisted the bar was the longest in the state.
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Along the dance floor was a raised stage for performers and a control room for DJs, and the decor featured natural wood, leaded glass and brass trim.
The bar’s management did its best to keep things spicy at Lettuce. Sometimes they’d book belly dancers and magicians or put on fashion shows. They’d frequently also put on their own versions of “The Dating Game” or invite locals to perform for a panel of judges in a take on “The Gong Show,” which ads in the newspaper promised would be “amazing, hilarious and sometimes shocking.”
Lettuce, one of the first clubs in town to invite male strippers to perform, also was known for its attractive male bartenders, who would often get into pretend water fights, then douse patrons with buckets of confetti. Those bartenders also famously eyeballed their pours of liquor rather than measuring them, meaning drinks could get a little strong.
Among Lettuce’s specialty cocktails were drinks called the Lettuceade and the Chocolate Snow Bear. True to the era, its wine selections were Burgundy, Chablis, Lambrusco and rose, which cost $1.75 a glass.
The bar also was known to attract famous or soon-to-be-famous acts. Locals say they saw Dire Straits, Bon Jovi, Rick Springfield and Sinbad there, and the club also was a popular hangout for members of the Wichita Wings soccer team.
Lettuce appears to have lasted until sometime in 1986. After that, the building was taken over by a jazz and supper club called Lady Jazzmine. In 1996, a restaurant and club called East India Trading Co. took over the space.
At the end of its life in the early 2000s, the building housed gay clubs The Metro and Big Daddy’s. It’s not clear exactly when it was torn down.
This story was originally published September 12, 2025 at 5:02 AM.
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