A Little Bit of Ankara in the Night

A Turkish immigrant found his way into Pittsburgh, and for a while, was the toast of Pittsburgh’s mob world. The days of big band dance clubs, floor shows and entertainers where regular joes comingled with the murky underworld of organized crime have disappeared into history. David S. Rotenstein, author and historian, details the fascinating story of Pleasant Hills nightclub, Ankara.

The Ankara bar pictured in an undated postcard. Author’s collection.

The Ankara was a point in Pittsburgh’s bright light belt, a string of roadhouses and nightclubs that popped up around Pittsburgh during Prohibition. Founded in 1946 by Turkish immigrant Charles Jamal, the Ankara became a destination for Pittsburghers, as well as the well-heeled mobsters who later owned it.

Jamal arrived in Pittsburgh in the early 1940s. He had come to the United States and worked in Butte, Montana as a waiter before moving to Pittsburgh. By 1942, he was living in Clairton where he owned a coffee shop.

Much of Jamal’s personal life remains a mystery. He was a slight man, only 5’2” tall, and the only known photo of Jamal was published in 1947 in the “Pittsburgh Bulletin Index,” a local magazine. Jamal never married, and his only local relative was a nephew, Remzi Gurcay, who emigrated in 1940 to study at Penn State.

In 1946, Jamal bought the first of two parcels in Pleasant Hill Township and opened the Ankara. He paid $2,000 for one of the tracts and assumed a $30,000 mortgage for the other — a big chunk of change for a smalltown coffee shop owner. “The town's newest night spot, the Ankara, on Route 51, beyond Bill Green's, expects to open in another two or three weeks,” columnist Harold V. Cohen wrote in the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette.

Jamal opened the club November 6, 1946. It was an instant sensation. Jamal turned away hundreds of people on opening night. He soon had popular local and national acts performing there. Local society columnists raved about the fine food, music, and dancing.

Less than a year after opening the club, key figures in Pittsburgh’s Jewish mob openly assumed leadership roles in the business when Sid Rubin became the Ankara’s manager. Rubin came to the Ankara after running a bar in Larimer, the Merry-Go-Round. Rubin’s stepfather, Nathan Mattes, was a former bootlegger and one of Pittsburgh’s top numbers gambling racketeers.

Born in Russia in 1898, Mattes moved to Pittsburgh’s Hill District as a child. Along with his two brothers, Israel and Sam, Mattes racked up multiple arrests for bootlegging, gambling, and political corruption.

By the 1940s, Mattes had become one of Pittsburgh’s most colorful racketeers. He ran several frequently raided numbers fronts in downtown Pittsburgh. Numbers, a street lottery that was a precursor to the Pennsylvania Lottery’s Daily Number game, had become the city’s leading vice, raking in millions for racketeers like Mattes.

In 1947, Allegheny County district attorney Artemas Leslie found a creative way to shut down Mattes’s latest spot, a Liberty Avenue cigar store. Leslie went to court to have the building declared a nuisance, forcing Mattes’s landlord to evict him and the business.

Four months after the downtown numbers station closed, Jamal hired Rubin. Mattes might have been a silent partner throughout the entire time that Jamal owned the Ankara. Rubin lasted a year before moving to Morgantown, West Virginia, where he and Mattes opened a steak house and casino.

In 1952, Jamal sought a buyer for the Ankara. He sold it to Squirrel Hill resident Fred Cenname. Yet, rumors persisted among Mattes’s family members and the press that the racketeer was the nightclub’s true owner.

Two years after Jamal sold the Ankara, its owners expanded their reach into Miami Beach. Ben Harvey, Mattes’s brother-in-law opened a 90-unit resort motel there in 1954, naming it, Motel Ankara. The Miami Ankara became a popular Pittsburgh mob outpost.

There are no surviving contemporaries who can describe Jamal’s ties to organized crime. The Ankara escaped the law enforcement raids of other area nightclubs, including nearby Bill Green’s. Jamal might have negotiated for protection by bribing officials.

Jamal died from Hodgkin’s disease at 62 in 1957. He had only $2,692 to his name: a 1950 Cadillac sedan worth $400, some furniture, savings bonds, and $659.73 in a First National Bank of Clairton checking account. After paying off funeral and medical expenses, Jamal’s estate paid $194.90 to the United States government to settle a $141,000 lien for income tax evasion between 1941 and 1950. He was buried in Mt. Vernon Cemetery beneath a headstone with a Turkish star and two crescents.

The Ankara closed in 1969, after Cenname sold the property to Chrysler Realty, the Detroit car company’s real estate arm. The company demolished the Ankara and built a car dealership. Today, the site is occupied by Fred Dean Honda.

The Ankara dining room pictured in an undated postcard. Author’s collection.

Numbers banker and former bootlegger Nathan Mattes was the Ankara’s reputed shadow owner.

The Ankara was a popular destination for a wide swath of Pittsburghers.

The Ankara’s owner, Charles Jamal, and some of the dishes the nightclub became famous for serving.

Charles Jamal’s Mt. Vernon Cemetery grave. Photo by David S. Rotenstein.

The Ankara employed a house photographer who took souvenir photos for diners.

The Bulletin Index published this photo of the Ankara’s exterior on July 10, 1948.