Butcher & Singer reunion at their old HQ-turned-chophouse
Alumni of the old Butcher & Singer brokerage plan a reunion at their old headquarters, now a Stephen Starr restaurant
Veterans of Butcher and Singer - the old Philadelphia brokerage - are holding a reunion next Thursday evening at their former headquarters at 1500 Walnut St. - now Butcher and Singer Steaks and Chops.
"It was a very colorful place. Very entrepreneurial," says veteran Philadelphia investment banker Michael Mufson, who's helping put the party together. About 30 Butcher people have signed up so far, including W.W. Keen Butcher, who with his brother Howard Butcher 3d ran the three-generation family firm until it was bought by Wheat First Securities (now part of Wells Fargo & Co.) in 1989. "We've lost touch with some. We're looking for them."
The space used to be Stephen Starr's fancy Striped Bass restaurant. But - this being Philadelphia - Mufson says that, for years after the conversion, men in suits continued to walk in the front door looking for their brokers. So Starr restored the old name for his new, retro-styled chop shop.
Mufson, now head of Mufson Howe Hunter & Co. LLC, notes a lot of other fancy old Philadelphia banks are now restaurants - Del Frisco's Double Eagle, SoleFood, the Capital Grill. “We’re all going back, to a restaurant," he marveled. "In the end that’s what we all turn into.”
And what do old investment bankers order? "Lots of beef."