Financial History Issue 112 (Winter 2015) | Page 39
Mel Nudelman/New York Stock Exchange
The members of the Club were at the
heart of the most dominant financial system ever created, and the elegant atmosphere reflected that. For decades, one of
the Exchange’s historic trading posts had
been set into the entrance of the main
dining room, and the famed bull and
bear statue sculpted by the Frenchman,
Isidore Bonheur, greeted members as well.
The sculpture is currently on view at the
Museum of American Finance.
The Club was like no other restaurant.
According to Pellecchia, “Every morning
before the bell and at lunchtime, the big,
wood-paneled main room was packed with
hundreds of members and their staffs. It
looked very formal, with everybody in business attire and the waiters in formal uniforms, but at the same time you couldn’t
find a more informal place anywhere,
because everyone knew everyone else and
were friends and colleagues, as well as fierce
competitors.”
Bob Zito, former executive vice president of the Exchange, reminisced that
the “staff was like family, which made the
experience amazing.”
Beyond the main dining room, the Club
had a service desk, and the employees who
worked there made a variety of arrangements including cars rides, theatre tickets,
holiday events, etc. The desk even cashed
checks. The Club also sported a reading
room where members had access to a
number of financial and non-financial
newspapers and periodicals from around
the world. Down the hall was a game room
complete with backgammon tables and
where plenty of gin rummy was played
(they even printed their own gin rummy
score cards). There was also the Luncheon
Club lounge with a ticker tape where light
lunches and drinks were served.
By the late 1990s, the Club had some
1,450 members. According to Pellecchia,
“It was boisterous, and in the morning
the intensity picked up as the trading
day approached. Members and their staffs
Dining room of the Stock Exchange
Luncheon Club, 1903.
would huddle at the large round tables and
talk about the news of the day. Specialists talked about what might impact their
assigned stocks, and brokers discussed
what could be expected from clients. There
was a great sense of anticipation and preparedness, besides the need to get enough
protein and carbohydrates to make it
through the intensity of a day on the floor.”
The Club was originally founded at
70 Broadway and moved to 18 Broad
Street when the current NYSE building
was completed in 1903. The neoclassic
building, designed by architect George B.
Post (1837–1913), features a classic portico,
colonnades and a triangular pediment. It
was also one of the first air conditioned
buildings. Its sister building at 11 Wall
Street was designed by Trowbridge &
Livingston and built in 1922. The SELC
was expanded into 11 Wall Street and thus
occupied space in both buildings, which
became seamless.
Tom Facchine, a NYSE executive floor
governor with designated market maker
KCG, said, “Personally, when I became
a member of SELC there was sense of
having ‘matured’ as a trader. In general
most young traders started out as clerks
or assistant traders who were not granted
membership to the SELC until they
became a member of the NYSE. When a
clerk or assistant learned the ropes and
was promoted to become a member of the
NYSE, he usually also became a member
of SELC. So becoming a member of SELC
was the community’s acceptance t ] [