So many great golden era DD tables out there, what do you recommend for $1000?

Lewm.
The DP80 was on my radar but price is just a little over where I really wanted to be. About $1000 just for the deck, then need a plinth  and an arm and now we are over $1500 or more.

The JVC/Victor TT-101 always intrigued me. I own the Victor UA-7045 tonearm & it is excellent, suspect the table would be as well.  

I paid $600 for my DP80 with plinth and DA307 tonearm, but of course that was about 8-10 years ago, and the DP80 was "broken".  Turned out to be an easy fix.  Anyway, even at $1500 a proper DP80 will compete with any belt-drive at least up to $5K.  I realize others may disagree, and I have no problem with that.  To each his own.  In my opinion, the DP80 will out-do the TT81 or PL70 but is on par with a tricked out SP10 Mk2.  I happened to like the DP80 better when I owned both, however.  TT101 would be more like competition for the DP80.

@lewm 

great the TT101 but if I have not recommended it is only because if it presents problems it is difficult to repair .. while the TT81 is very comparable to the TT101 with a few less features and fewer problems.

Outside there are several unsolved TT101 cases.... and I'm one of them.

I've lived for years with DP75 (with mineral plinth and AT-1100 tonearm). It's a very dependable and solid machine and by most accounts very similar in quality to DP80, but somewhat easier to find and at a lower price. 

I switched to PL70L II, which I much preferred over the DP75. But I attribute this mostly to the wonderful tonearm, which makes this Pioneer a great choice in your price range. I got it at HiFiDo several years ago for less than $1000, but have to assume its market value has gone up since.