TableView hides entire header in case that all the columns are not visible. This behavior was introduced in JDK8, previous versions did that only in case that table does not have any column at all.

This results in problem in case that the menu button is visible and user has made all columns hidden. There is no way to make any column visible at all because the button is hidden too.

Tested on 8u5 and 8u20_b17. It works in 7u60.

Menu is not well usable from user point of view too. Imagine that you want to show/hide 4 or more columns, but each action hides entire menu.