This week on Not So Long Ago, GM heads up Wisconsin Ave. a smidge to the late great Commander Salamander. The space is sadly empty, but from 1979 until the end of 2010, Commander Salamander was a favorite of DC-area teens looking to break the mold (or at least, jump into another less common mold).
The 1993 picture shows Commander Salamander about halfway through its life. What GM didn’t realize is that Commander Salamander used to occupy only half the space. The other half was occupied by a store called Bootlegger. It was apparently a shoe store and was open as late as 1998. GM’s not sure when it closed.
Here are the photos:
The Georgetown Metropolitan 
In about 1984 or 85, Commander Salamander sold tickets… not sure what all of the venues were, but amongst those, amazingly, were tickets on Virgin Atlantic. I bought a very inexpensive ticket to London there on Virgin. That was my only foray into Salamander!
Commander Salamander was THE place to go to buy rock and roll tickets for any concert playing in the DC area. Owned and operated by Chuck Rendleman who himself looks like Keith Richards of the Rolling Stones, this hip clothing store, which opened in the hippie era, catered to the punks, the gagas of their day, and anyone else who wanted something different. Rendleman also owned Up Against the Wall on M Street for years and years, another free spirit store.
Wasn’t it owned by a woman named Wendy Ezrailson?
Bootlegger was owned by Douglas Seigel and his wife Rose thay had four stores around the Dc area, Georgetown, International Square, Connecticut ave and Montgomery Mall. The had some great shoes and a custom lines of pumps named Palms.