I was too young to drink when I left New York. I didn't start frequenting such establishments until I was a student at Wayne State University in Detroit. Oddly enough, one of the neighborhood watering holes there was named the Bronx Bar, so you could say I did drink in the Bronx.
My first legal drink was a screwdriver at the Pour House (formerly the Silver Edge) on Tremont Avenue. It was there that I had previously met a very kind young man who became my old man.