02/01/2026
Excerpts from an article from 10 years ago...
Eugene Haslam is not known for being a man of few words, so a recent Facebook post from the owner of the popular York Street nightclub Zaphod Beeblebrox caught many by surprise not only for its content, but also its brevity.
“Goodbye. It’s time for another chapter in my life. I hope you’ve enjoyed what I have done so far,” he wrote late last month. The post was accompanied by a Douglas Adams quote, fitting since Zaphod Beeblebrox is a character in Adams’s book The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy. There was also a video of the S*x Pistols performing their version of My Way.
What was missing, however, was an explanation. Until now.
“By my post, I’m putting you on notice. I’m putting ME on notice,” Mr. Haslam says in an interview with OBJ while relaxing at his kitchen table. “I’m putting me on notice and I’m saying I’ve taken this weight off me and I’m handing it to the city, to the people of Ottawa. I’ve done for you, this for so long. You want it to continue? Go ahead. You figure it out.”
Mr. Haslam, suffered a stroke four years ago, but he is healthy now, he says. He talks about former finance minister Jim Flaherty, who died shortly after retiring to spend more time with his family. “He left to spend time with his family and there was none left. I don’t want that to be my story,” says Mr. Haslam.
“Doing the pool, the garden – I like those things,” he says. Pool cleaner and gardener might not be the image that immediately comes to mind when thinking about the man who has run Zaphod’s on York Street for the past 22 years and at its original location on Rideau Street for a couple of years before that.
Mr. Haslam also opened the Brigadier’s Pump in 1983 and The Underground nightclub in 1985.
Before starting the Brigadier’s Pump, he spent seven years as a banker with the Bank of Nova Scotia. After The Underground closed in 1987, he went back to the banking world, this time with Toronto Dominion.
He needed more than good wishes when he left for good to open the first Zaphod’s on Rideau Street. “I had chosen to follow this dream of music. I didn’t want to fail,” he says. “Zaphod’s was me and some good personal friends. They scrounged up the money. I had the idea.”
Mr. Haslam says he did contribute some money – one dollar.
The money did come, says Mr. Haslam – slowly. He says it has never been a concern to him, since he arrived in Canada, from Calcutta, India, as a 15-year-old in 1972 with just $8 in his pocket. He says he always “works to live,” not the other way around.
Over the years, while other clubs came and went, Zaphod’s remained, playing host to a number of bands that went on to be huge.
A club owner’s life isn’t always smooth sailing, however, and Mr. Haslam had his share of bumps in the road when he ventured out of the Byward Market in the mid ’90s, entering a partnership to re-open Barrymore’s Music Hall. When that partnership dissolved, he went on to open Zaphod’s 2, just two doors down from Barrymore’s. That club lasted just 18 months, again thanks to a breakup with his partners.
Mr. Haslam took sole ownership of Zaphod’s in 2000, and it has been his main focus ever since. He says he had to choose between being a caretaker of an institution – Barrymore’s – or staying with his own creation on York Street. As he prepares to walk away from that creation, his future is wide open, he says.
“I’ve seen the industry start from the lowest levels and I see how it interacts on a cultural level, on a funding level, on a political level, on a business level. I think I have all that. Perhaps maybe the (Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission) may want to chat with me and put me on a board,” he says.
One thing he says he won’t do is throw his hat in the ring for the upcoming municipal election, although it’s clear his community means a lot to him. Mr. Haslam says his bid to be Capital Ward councillor in the last election fell short largely because he entered the race too late.
Now, he says, he is gearing up for another election of sorts – on the future of Zaphod’s. “I’m asking the public to vote again,” he says. “Many years ago, they voted when we first opened that this is what we wanted. We want to create a community place unlike anything else. I’m asking the community, ‘Do you give it a mandate again?’ Think about it. And not only just for its social aspect, but its musical aspect. What does it mean to you as a city?” And if the right ownership group doesn’t emerge? “Then they have spoken and that’s cool too.”
One of the reasons he hasn’t set a strict timetable for closing the doors, he says, is he doesn’t want to see a flood of people coming only on the last day. That happened with his original location on Rideau Street, and it remains a bad memory for him, one he says still “sticks in my craw.”
For now, his community is still Zaphod’s, a place he said he is very proud of because it includes everyone, regardless of gender, race, fashion, sexual preference or musical style. “You should always feel safe here,” he says.
Haslam continues to, in his words, “curate.” “I see my work the same way as a gallery owner… the way you curate, it says something about you and your direction and your audience.”
What does it say about him?
“I’m whacked out,” he says.
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"I may not have gone where I intended to go, but I think I have ended up where I needed to be." - Douglas Adams.
