Pursuits: A Presidential Pub Crawl

Rick Friedman for The New York Times

Both President Reagan and a campaigning Bill Clinton stopped by the Eire Pub in Dorchester, Mass.

Presidents Kennedy, Nixon and Clinton walked into a bar. This is no joke. The bar is Martin's Tavern in Washington, and it serves an above-average pot roast.

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Matt Roth for The New York Times

John Boswell, a veteran bartender at Off the Record in Washington, D.C., recalls seeing George H. W. Bush and his son, then the governor of Texas, at the bar.

This isn't the only bar patronized by American presidents, of course. Curious about others, we visited more than a dozen East Coast places that lay claim to a presidential past. Half history lesson, half goose chase, our journey took us to a number of joints that walk a fine line between celebrating their past and wearing presidential celebrity on their sleeve — and those that achieve that balance deserve a visit.

MARTIN'S TAVERN Serving first families and everyday Georgetown denizens since 1933, Martin's boasts visits by every United States president since Harry S. Truman, except for the nation's current one, all before they were commander in chief.

Mismatched Tiffany-style lamps hang above an original mahogany bar. Weathered wooden booths envelop patrons dining on President Richard M. Nixon's favored meatloaf or President Truman's preferred pot roast. For a uniquely Martin's experience, visitors can sit in the Rumble Seat, the one-seated, one-sided booth No. 11, where President John F. Kennedy regularly took breakfast and read the paper while in Congress. The Proposal Booth, booth No. 3, is curiously one of two tables we encountered on our trip that is named as the site of Kennedy's engagement to Jacqueline Bouvier. "We're not going to say it didn't not happen here," was the fourth-generation owner Billy A. Martin Jr.'s circuitous account of the proposal.

If the dining room is packed, retreat to the "dugout room," a cozy cavern where President Lyndon B. Johnson sipped his favorite cocktail, Scotch and soda, while conspiring alongside House Speaker Sam Rayburn in booth No. 24. Today, Martin's seats fewer politicians. But that didn't stop Mr. Martin from urging Teresa Heinz Kerry to bring in her husband, Secretary of State John Kerry, for a taste of tradition leading up to the 2004 presidential election.

"It has always been good luck," Mr. Martin said. As for Mr. Kerry, he never did make it.

1264 Wisconsin Avenue NW, Washington; (202) 333-7370; martins-tavern.com.

THE TOMBS Not far from Martin's is this discreet Georgetown cellar, where President Bill Clinton, as a Georgetown undergraduate, joined classmates for beer and burgers, steps from his M Street dorm. In his autobiography, "My Life," he identifies the Tombs, a bunker of a bar beneath Georgetown's swanky 1789 restaurant, as a former haunt. Pitchers hang above a large square bar, awaiting refill from a bow-tie-clad, student-aged staff. Barside engravings pay homage to a lineage of barkeeps. President Clinton would no doubt approve of the current scene, where a good meal can still be had for under $15, and Georgetown students continue to take refuge from the city above.

1226 36th Street NW, Washington; (202) 337-6668; tombs.com.

THE ROUND ROBIN BAR AT THE WILLARD INTERCONTINENTAL At this hotel — the self-proclaimed Residence of Presidents — folklore has Ulysses S. Grant coining the term "lobbyists" as a label for those who loitered after him in the Willard's lobby (never mind references to the verb "lobbying" from before the Willard opened its doors). Order a drink in the lobby, as those supposed petitioners did near Grant, and watch the post-theater crowd parade in.

1401 Pennsylvania Avenue, Washington; (202) 628-9100; intercontinental.com.

OFF THE RECORD AT THE HAY-ADAMS Our last stop in the District was a secluded alternative to the more flamboyant Willard. Overlooking 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue, the 144-room Hay-Adams hotel was the home of President Obama and his family in the weeks before he took office and may be the closest most people can get to sleeping in the White House. However, in a quiet basement lounge, visitors might find a future leader of the free world just trying to unwind. The bar is Off the Record, and John Boswell, a veteran bartender there, has served every president since Gerald R. Ford, before or after they became president. Its crimson, button-backed benches tuck into the walls to afford clientele sanctuary in which, as the bar's Web site puts it, they can "be seen and not heard."

Mr. Boswell, the affable and tight-lipped weeknight bartender, would reveal not a single utterance he's heard in 16 years at the bar. He wouldn't even say how many presidents he's served in the bar itself versus the hotel at large. But Mr. Boswell did offer some reminiscences. He recalled the "sweet" sight of George H. W. Bush and his son, then the governor of Texas, at the bar, going largely unnoticed. President Clinton would duck in between fund-raisers at the hotel above, Mr. Boswell recalled, sipping sauvignon blanc barside. Former Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton was said to be a more frequent visitor when she was serving in the Senate, but you didn't hear it from him.

Amid the dark red walls, political caricatures and low lighting that have kept this bar's White House crowd shrouded in mystery, finish the day with an apropos Presidential — a vodka martini with blue-cheese olives. "We like to stick to the classics," Mr. Boswell said. "John McCain doesn't want a razzle-dazzle martini."

800 16th Street NW, Washington; (202) 638-6600; hayadams.com.

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