Jolly Tinker

Has deff been here for awhile but on a Saturday it’s not my scene. I’m more of a dancing sort of person and this bar is not for that. More of a relaxed feel. Clean and friendly thou

But fifteen minutes later
We had our first taste of whiskey
There was uncles giving lectures
On ancient Irish history
The men all started telling jokes
And the women they got frisky
At five o’clock in the evening
Every bastard there was piskey
Fare thee well going away
There’s nothing left to say
Farewell to New York City boys
To Boston and PA
He took them out
With a well-​aimed clout
He was often heard to say
I’m a free born man of the USA
I’M A FREE BORN MAN OF THE USA

No frills dive bar. Nice, dark ambiance. A few TV screens showing whatever game is on. Pool table towards the back. Cash only bar. This is the spot you go to when meeting others before starting your night… Or when you just need a drink and don’t want annoyances like music and people to bother you.

If Moe’s Bar from The Simpsons was real, it would be the Tinker. Awesome, genuine and divey in a way that you don’t feel you’ll be raped, mugged and cracked over the head with a pool cue if you drop in.
The Tinker is small, stuffy and the beer selection is limited– but there’s a pool table, tv, juke box, friendly bar staff and pizza and burrito joints within 100ft of the entrance. You aren’t here to sip cognac or order a flight of local craft IPAs– this is where you go to tie one on, guys. Then go get a lasagna slice next door when you’re good and sloppy.
Every time I go I have a blast and wake up the next morning feeling like a turd on a garbage can lid.

As opposed to all the other reviews for Jolly Tinker, I was NEVER a Fordham University student.
I happened to stumble into this bar with a co-​worker and her friends.
It’s a bar… like the kind of bar that you would NOT expect in that specific area of the Bronx. It has an old time neighborhood feel, disgusting bathroom, and cheap prices.
You’re in for quite the sight!

Fun spot that is awesome if you’re not looking to drive to the city to get a buzz. That female bartender is incredibly rude however, I haven’t been back since so I don’t know if she still works there. The other guys check out though

Was at the JOLLY TINKER for there 45 Anniversary, had a great time everyone was enjoying themselves. lots of memories.

Last time I was here, the bartender Patty (yes, actual Irish bartender in an Irish bar) remembered me and we discussed how the neighborhood wasn’t the same anymore and the bar wasn’t as fun. Big cop bar too, so don’t try to get out of line or you’re liable to get put down. Pool table in the middle, and disgusting bathrooms. The back room was the sight of numerous epic beer pong nights. A true Bronx dive and one I surely will remember fondly. For God sakes, pitchers used to be $ 5!

It’s a bar… period. Not bad, not swanky, a drinkers bar.
What I liked most about the Jolly Tinker was meeting the gentleman the owns the bar a retired NYC fireman.

This bar has GREAT drink specials, friendly service, cool interior and fun vibes. You can tell its full of history. My friends and I went up to the Bronx to check out the Botanical Garden and we popped in here for a few drinks afterwards. We would definitely come back to the area just for the Jolly Tinker because we loved the crowd, the music, the specials and had a ton of fun. Its also really close to the B, D,4 trains, Botanical Garden and Fordham’s campus. I will definitely be back!

Went here today after getting banned from another bar in the Bronx long story, it was pretty strange and not homey like other bars I go to and I only went here for a cheap drink. The best part was the jukebox and the 4 dollar beer!

Only come here if you are a Fordham University freshman… any older than that and you should be going to the tri-​bar.
Tiny place. When I came here, we played pool and beer pong in the back room. Can’t complain… but don’t expect much, it IS in a shitty area in the Bronx.

TINKERS! This is the bar that would let you in regardless of your age and looks, dead serious! I don’t know how the door the policy is now, because i have not been there in ages, I’d say maybe 6 – 7 years but all you had to do was flash your fake id, don’t act timid and if anything slip a $ 20 to the bouncer who looked un-​interested and I’d say about 98% of the time you were getting into the bar. THIS IS A STRAIGHT UP FORDHAM UNIV. BAR FOR FORDHAM STUDENTS. You really don’t have any business being here unless you happen to know the bartenders like i do, your irish from woodlawn or yonkers or your a fordham univ students. There really is no other reason than looking for a drunk college girl or guy (depending on your gender) to have some type of grenade-​esque atom bomb type hook up with, b/​c it’s not the prettiest crowd, unless you have severe beer goggles. The bar is super small and always pretty packed, whenever i went i really just stuck to beer b/​c they have some pretty good specials and good ale’s on tap. On the weekends when Fordham is in session it can be a slop tart fest and cluster f*ck so it’s going to be packed whether your in the front or back section, my suggestion stay in the front, some entertaining things happen at that bar, I’ve seen a lot of gross and forgettable hook ups, people busting their asses and some pretty outrageous fights, this place is a circus, lol. The best bartender their is my boy Daren and if Patty is still their go to him as well, they will make sure you have a good time, at least drink wise.

Let me put you wise: there is no reason to come here unless you are a local regular, a Fordham student, a Fordham grad feeling particularly nostalgic for those many, many, drunken nights, or an Irish immigrant straying south of Woodlawn. That being said, Tinkers is a Fordham institution, and as such will always hold a very special place in my heart.
It will be dirty, there will be an unbearably long bathroom line, questionably attractive couples will be sucking face IN your face, anti-​smoking laws will be blatantly ignored, and the crowd will be packed wall to wall with sloppy drunk Fordham kids, especially if it’s a weekend after eleven. You may also have to dodge errant pool cues and flying elbows and ping pong balls from the occasional beer pong game. And yet, to many a Fordham student, Tinkers is sheer magic.
This can be explained, believe it or not. Compared the famed Arthur Avenue Tri-​Bar of MUGZ’s, Howl, and Ziggy’s, the crowd has less polo shirted preps and no iron-​pumping orange guidos or skankily attired hos. It is content to remain an Irish pub in the Bronx, and has no pretensions of being «the club,» a fact which its clientele accepts and embraces. If there is dancing, it is not of the sketchy grind-​up-​on-​you variety, but of the delightfully joyful, uninhibited drunken variety. The jukebox is full of classic bar tunes to which the crowd loudly sings along, plus a fine selection of Irish tunes and a disc recorded by the ever-​present bouncer. But the reason that Tinkers remains so near and dear to the hearts of so many a Fordhamite is its status as a freshman initiation rite. Having never participated in any variety of underage drinking, I was incredibly nervous about the whole enterprise. I should not have feared: a quick flash of my Fordham ID, I was in and anxiously sipping on a cup of slightly warm beer someone had generously offered me from their $ 7 pitcher. In and out and under a half an hour, it was hardly a great night, but it was the start of something big. In the three semesters that followed, I made many a sober trip to Tinkers (!! I know), enjoying it just because it was college and something to do on the weekend, everyone was a potential new friend, and I could feel superior knowing I wasn’t going to embarrass myself with the drunken antics that were on display from so many of my peers.
However, there also were occasions when I would partake in cheap Tinkers beer, such as the evening when half my Honors math class went out the night before our 9:30 class. It was college, and such behavior was easy to justify. Or then there was the first time I can ever say I was drunk, during finals first semester on a particularly empty night. While my guy friends used the restroom, a local memorably offered to get me into «The Garden,» for free. Even while struggling to adjust to my mind-​altered state, I was able to discern that he meant the nearby Botanical Gardens, and not Madison. Somewhere along the line, I too carved my name in the back room wall with the key to Queen’s Court, joining the Pantheon of Tinkers lovers for all eternity. The site of many a memorable evening, Tinkers will always be remembered fondly by this Fordham grad, and scores of others.
Bonus points: 11 months ago today, Boyfriend asked me to join him for drinks at the Jolly Tinker, and the rest is history. Shithole or not, it’d be hard to find a more memorable venue for our first date.

So many memories, come to mind when I hear the name Tinkers; from carving my name into the back wall as a freshman with my dorm key, to step-​dancing to The Pogues for a free drink, this couldn’t have happened in a more suitable environment.
Upon entering most patrons will be happy to notice plenty of seating along the right wall, a pool table crowded with «skeevy» locals looking to shack up with Fordham girls, and a huge bar big enough to fit plenty of locals, students, and others wanting to imbibe. The drinks are cheap and strong enough to get the job done, but don’t come here expecting any of those delightful cocktails you might enjoy in Manhattan, stick with simple mixes like Vodka Cranberry, Jack and Coke, or if you are feeling adventurous a Long Island Ice Tea.
A few feet away from the far end of the bar are two steps that lead up to the Women’s restroom, and the back room. Now, these two steps do not seem daunting to the sober person, but I have witnessed many a drunk student stumble on these steps, if you ever find yourself here please try to take these with caution. The back room of Tinkers is where the magic happens, usually full of beer-​pong players, sloppy make outs with boob grabs, and people carving their name on the wall with various sharp objects.
A secret that I learned my Sophomore year, on a particularly empty night, was that the stack of books near the door are actually Fire Hall log books from the late 19^th century, how they got into a place like Tinkers is beyond me, but it just shows how much you can learn about a place when you scratch beneath the surface.

TINKERS. What reeling, smirking nostalgia dives that word must compel for oh so many Fordham students. Tinkers is a fantastically ordinary place blessed by proximity to a university campus and mischievous fairy dust that casts a love enchantment on anyone who ever enters.
Or maybe its magic is more like a Siren call embedded in «Paradise City» which filters through the bar infinite-​minus-​one times a night, along with other classic rock radio hits that play on loop. On any given night, bar occupants will dependably belt out the lyrics to this song in particular at least once. (This alcoholic ritual is the closest Fordham gets to school spirit)
Inside visitors find (and regulars take for granted) a locus of fun, tragedy and ill-​advised falling in Like. Tables by the windows house coats or tame Tinkers fans. There’s a pool table at the end of the room, and to the left up two steps that can sometimes be fatal is the girls’ singular toilet, the definition of grody, which usually has no toilet paper but at least two girls hoping to shorten the wait by going in at the same time. The typical. In the back room are festering beer pong games and more seating.
It is a relatively large space, normally saturated on Tuesdays, Thursdays, Fridays, and Saturdays by a cross section of the Bronx Fordham populace. The place oscillates between upper classmen & locals hang out and freshmen frenzy. Right now, Fordham is in a dark period; the freshmen are everywhere.
The floor is probably gross, and the bartenders are more apt to acknowledge a guy waiting to order than any girl. They won’t gyp you on the alcohol. Long Island iced teas and $ 6 (or $ 4?) pitchers are prevalent, but you can have your tequila shots with salt and lime (usu.) smashed up against the bar. Just don’t ask for a blow job; they’ll have to look it up and there is no whipped cream at the Jolly Tinkers.
On other nights, the Tink is a tame place. Summers are empty or not open. Locals stop by, mingle with the student body sometimes. All in all, it’s just your typical dive joint a solid trudge away from campus gates. Cops raid the place on occasion, which I’ve heard is hysterical. And at the end of the night, it all goes down in the barely remembered history of an institution known as the Jolly Tinker.