HERITAGE

To celebrate the 60th anniversary of the iconic Playboy Bunny, we asked more than a dozen Bunnies—and one Rabbit—to take a hop with us down memory lane

- ANNIE MARIE FOX

On February 29, 1960 the first Playboy Club opened its doors, and into pop culture bounded the Bunny. With her satin ears, sheer stockings, boned corset and white tail (the cuffs and collars came later), she has resided in our collective imagination ever since. Like the indelible Playboy Rabbit Head, the Bunny symbolizes the ideal of sophisticated pleasure. But unlike the inanimate logo, the Bunnies had the hard work of actually bringing that ideal to life.

It was a good job — if you could get it. Hundreds of Bunny hopefuls typically applied at each new club, some company-owned and others franchise-operated. Bunnies could be found working in 25 states and seven countries and, after Playboy’s private DC-9 airplane took offin the early 1970s, in the sky as well. From Jamaica to New Jersey, London to Lansing and Omaha to Osaka, the Playboy hotels, casinos and resorts offered endless amenities and activities — horseback riding, scuba diving, skeet shooting, skiing, roulette. The bushy-tailed Bunny was the ever-present standard bearer (and still is: Visit our Playboy Club in London).

Bunny training was rigorous, and standards were high. The so-called Bunny Mothers were managers who enforced rules laid out in the intimidatingly thick Bunny Manual, but for the Bunnies, tips and other perks including tuition assistance and appearance fees made the difficult job worthwhile. In the early 1980s, for example, Bunnies hired to appear at events approved by Playboy earned $17.50 an hour — more than five times the minimum wage.

The clubs were showplaces for comedians, jazz musicians and other performers, but it was the Bunnies, with their practicedto-perfection perch, stance and dip, who were the steady draw. For a short while in the mid-1980s, Rabbits — male servers who were Bunny counterparts — had their time in the New York hutch; more than 1,500 men applied for 25 positions.