Eulogy for Sleaze

Sweet little personal memoir about the sublime sleaze that infested 42nd Street before the corporations cleaned it up.

A Times Square Peep-Show Worker Remembers the Dirty Days

I worked at Times Square peep shows from 1982 until 1995. Back when Times Square was a red-light district, you could get anything there. You wanted to meet someone, get laid, make money, get high? No problem.

The Show World building was the peep palace—every masturbator had to go there. I started working at Show Follies, a satellite of Show World, when I was 21 years old. It was my academic study. Field work.

You have to start out as a mop man. It was also called a scum scrubber, a jizz mopper, or a sperm swabber. You had to disinfect the booths quickly so another guy could get in there. Customers would spend more if the peep booth was clean. Our slogan was You drop it, we mop it.

It’s not just guys in raincoats who go to places like this. Everyone has to answer the call. A lot of men want to masturbate around lunchtime. We’d call that a “box lunch.” I don’t have to explain that, do I? One guy, an executive, wore a three-piece suit. He’d go into a girl’s booth and open up his briefcase, very daintily. He’d pull out a pink tutu, white shoes, long gloves, and a bonnet. He’d put the whole thing on and say to the girl, “I’m Little Bo-Peep and I’ve lost my sheep.” He’d go in there and just talk to her. He just wanted to relate. That’s what it was all about. People just went to relate.