In 1933, Chris and Fannie Baker opened Baker's as a lunchtime sandwich restaurant. In 1934, their son Clarence Baker began booking jazz pianists, but Baker's was still known at that time principally as a restaurant. Baker's is noted for its long history of presenting local and major jazz acts, its excellent acoustics, its intimacy - seating only 99, its Art Deco furnishings, including a distinctive, piano-shaped bar painted with a keyboard motif, Art Deco style paintings of European city landscapes by Harry Julian Carew, tilted mirrors that allow patrons to view the pianist's hands, and its Steinway piano which was selected and purchased in New York by Tatum for Clarence in the 1950s.