Ercole’s Bar’s Gary Moore remembered in Manhattan Beach
Ercole’s bartenders Michelle Martinez (nee Benavidez) Mike Benavidez and Marty Aquino. Photo
Ercole’s Cocktails looked the same on the day of Gary Moore’s wake as it did the day he died at age 86, on August 26, exactly one month earlier. That’s the way he wanted it, the way he wanted it to remain and the way it will remain, said his niece Staci Clark, who inherited the bar. Moore bought the bar in 1972 and, like the previous owners, left it looking the same as it had when it opened in 1927. Except he added a grill to make his signature hamburgers, or “beer sponges,” as customers call them.
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Mike Benevidez.
Marty Aquino.
Bartender Mike Benavidez with the Clark family (left to right) Dennis, Staci, MacKenzie and Courtney.
Don and Gigi Kustondia, BJ Golik and Ron Ellis.
Bob, Mike, Jim and Greg.
Ercole's.
Shellback bartender John Regan, Marianne Centem and Bonnie Shroder.
McCauley and Linda Lansdown, the original Ercolette
Jemma with Henry Queen and Michael McCarter.
Shellback bartender John Regan, Adrienne Slaughter and Ercole’s bartender Martin Aquino
Gene and John.
Bob White, Mike Benavidez, Tom Raycraft and Dottie Horn.
Jolene O'Hara and Mike Benjamin.
Nic Nichols, Terry Rauch, who tended bar at Ercole’s from 1974 to 1979, and Tom Hendrix.
Ercole's.
Veda Casper, Patti Hunt, Bonnie Schroeder, Sue Weidig, Jiny McKenna, Sue White and Pat Agavina.
Bob White and Linda Lansdown, the original Ercolette. She needed a phony id to order her first drink at Ercole’s.
Linda Lansdown.
Mike Benavidez (center) and Michelle and Steve Martinez
Helen Wedemeyer and Tom Hendrix, who used Ercole’s as an ATM before there were ATMs.
The Clark family.
The Clark sisters.
Bartenders Michelle and brother Mike Benavidez and Martin Aquino.
Doorman Ruben Rodela.
Bob White with his "Ode to Ercole's."
Ercole's unchanged.