NY's oldest bartender still mixing martinis at 90

NEW YORK, Aug 24 (Reuters) A man who mixed martinis for Marilyn Monroe and poured Scotch for John Lennon was feted as New York's oldest bartender when he turned 90 this week, and he vowed to keep working.

Hoy Wong, who was born in Hong Kong and served in the US military in World War II, is known simply as Mr Hoy at the historic Algonquin Hotel where he has served Manhattans and martinis for the past 27 years in the dimly lit Blue Bar.

The hotel is best known as the favored lunch spot of the 1920s literary circle The Round Table, whose members included the founders of The New Yorker magazine.

The Algonquin, which touts Hoy as the city's oldest bartender, threw a birthday party for him on Tuesday night, inviting customers past and present as well as staff, friends and family. Asked about retirement, Hoy said: ''I never think about that. ... Now I'm 90 but I don't feel I'm that old.'' Hoy started tending bar in 1948 and worked at various hotels and restaurants, including Freeman Chum in New York where he served Monroe drinks, before moving to the Algonquin where former Beatle Lennon used to order Scotch.

Hoy was coy about his celebrity customers, but his granddaughter Jennifer Zhang-Mckenna said he would occasionally come home with anecdotes from work.

''He would tell me that the Duke of Windsor told him he made the best martini in the world,'' Zhang-Mckenna told Reuters.

''One day he said 'People all think that Marilyn Monroe is beautiful but I'm telling you, the prettiest is Elizabeth Taylor, though Marilyn Monroe is just sweet.' She would come to the bar and say with her sweet voice 'Hi, Mr Hoy,''' she said.

Zhang-Mckenna said she would be surprised if Hoy ever retires.

''He can't relax. I said 'When are you going to retire?' and he said 'I don't know, maybe I'll work for a couple more years,' and that was 10 years ago,'' she said.

REUTERS VJ BST0431