gin mills

By any description, it’s a stunning transformation from the urban slag of peep shows, gin mills and massage parlors known as “the Deuce” back in 1971 — the time and place in which a magnificent new HBO drama series, “The Deuce,” is immersed.

It had suffered a devastating economic downturn in the 1970s and 1980s when the cotton gin mills closed.

By 1950, Miss Starr had become the featured attraction at the 2 O’Clock Club on Baltimore’s notorious “Block,” which Time magazine described as “a loud, neon-bathed concentration of gin mills and peel parlors” that was “something of an Eldorado for the fun-seeking male.”

The number of flophouses, gin mills and charities that catered to the area dwindled to dozens.

Another transformed avenue is Third, where the gin mills and high-class junkshops that once flourished in the dappled darkness under the elevated have given way to vast air-conditioned skyscrapers, into which many Madison Avenue advertising men have migrated.