WILLIAMSBURG, Brooklyn (WABC) — Maria Antonia Clay, better known as Toñita, was already a legend to generations of Latinos familiar with her Caribbean Social Club in Williamsburg, Brooklyn, long before the world got to know her through a cameo in Bad Bunny’s NFL halftime show.
For more than half a century, Toñita has presided over the Williamsburg institution, a home away from home for generations of people caught between cultures.
The Puerto Rico-born Toñita first opened the doors on Grand Street in 1974 as a hangout for a local baseball team. It quickly became far more than a place to hear salsa and Spanish, play pool and dominoes. It became a gathering place for the diaspora.
“I felt like I was home, I felt like I was in my abuela’s house. She’s adopted a whole community, I’m just one of the many,” Giovanni Gonzalez said.
Gonzalez, now Toñita’s manager, discovered the club after leaving the island of his birth and settling in New York.
“In a city where most things are transactional, this is the one place that is just about love,” Gonzalez said.
Toñita feeds her community spiritually and literally. Every day at 3 p.m., she brings down pots of food she cooks in her apartment upstairs.
“Arroz, habichuelas, y ensalada de bacalao,” Toñita said.
The food is always free, while beers cost $3.
Toñita has also become a celebrity to celebrities, hosting photo shoots including one with Madonna and Bad Bunny. Her friendship with Bad Bunny led to her NFL halftime cameo in a reproduction of her club.
Her honors include lifetime achievement awards and, most recently, a Congressional Medallion of Excellence, where she was celebrated at a gala event in Washington.
Through it all, Toñita has continued serving her community in Williamsburg. She has watched the neighborhood gentrify around her and said she has been offered millions to sell.
Asked about her plans for the future, Toñita responded, “Quedarme aquí hasta que me muera.”
“She doesn’t do it for celebrity or money. She could be in Puerto Rico in her own house. But she chooses to be here because of her community. That’s her only concern,” Gonzalez said.
Toñita also presides over Toñita Fest, a yearly block party launched in 2024. The event closes down Grand Street on the last Sunday in June, where the longtime hostess continues nurturing the next generation of people caught between cultures.
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