1988 Drug Offense Shuts Bar

The Bow and Arrow Pub has been closed down for the month of March as punishment for a 1988 drug-related offense, the bar's manager said yesterday.

Harvey Goodman, manager of the Bow and Arrow, said the Cambridge License Commission temporarily closed the club because it exhausted its options to appeal a 1989 suspension order.

In 1988, one of the pub's bar-tenders was found guilty of selling cocaine at the bar.

The bar was ordered to close for 30 days in 1989 by the Cambridge License Commission, but stayed open until last month, when it lost the last of several state and local appeals, Goodman said.

Goodman said none of the bar's current employees were involved in the incident. "Absolutely no one who works here now was involved in that situation. The woman involved was immediately fired upon her arrest," he said.

The club unsuccessfully petitioned to pay a fee to the commission in lieu of closing the club, said Sally R. Alcorn, executive director of the Harvard Square Business Association.

Goodman described the fine which the owners offered to pay as "in excess of $10,000," and "equivalent to the revenue that they will lose from closing for a month."

The manager said the bar's owners made their proposal because the employees would suffer if the bar closed. "The employees depend heavily on income from tips, and when the place is closed, all of that income is lost to them," Goodman said.

To celebrate its return to business, the Bow and Arrow intends to hold a grand re-opening celebration on March 31, Goodman said.

"I'll be using this month to gear up for our big comeback," he said.

Neither the Cambridge License Commission nor the bar's owners returned phone calls yesterday.