The horseshoe bar in the center of the room is the literal and figurative centerpiece of Dirty Frank’s, the epicenter of a dive bar that the Philadelphia Inquirer once described as a “crossroads for errant individuals.” Rumor has it that one such errant individual was Bob Dylan, thrown out of the bar by John Segal, owner at the time, who was unaware of who he was bouncing. One of those regulars is now permanently and physically paired with Dirty Frank’s, the ashes of the individual found within one of the Philadelphia dive bar’s walls.
It is difficult to envision a higher dive bar honor than being named Customer of the Year at Philadelphia’s Dirty Frank’s, where a customer Hall of Fame populates an interior wall with framed photos of regulars. Customer of the Year winners receive plaques and no doubt bragging rights for a full calendar year. Images of other locals can be found throughout the space, along the walls and maybe most prominently within the structure of the bar counter itself, the vintage and faded photos preserved under epoxy. Those same regulars are responsible for the hand-cut paper snowflakes that hang throughout Dirty Frank’s.
Weathered wooden booths making for snug drinking confines thanks to slender dimensions line the walls within Dirty Frank’s. A red, converted phone booth can be found along the bar’s front wall, a small drinking ledge and bench offering a prominent solitary drinking outpost under a vintage Miller sign. Over the benches on one side of the building, the Off The Wall Gallery maintains a rotating selection of local art pieces, a tradition instituted in 1979. Along another wall, a makeshift library of sorts (a pile of books) is just one piece of a busy visual display of classic dive bar odds and ends.