Posted on 08/23/2016 7:32:32 PM PDT by RightGeek
BANGOR, Maine — The closing of one of the last two Howard Johnson restaurants in a couple of weeks will mark the end of its fried clam strips, ice cream and other menu staples that nourished baby boomers and leave the once-proud restaurant chain teetering on the brink of extinction.
The slice of roadside Americana will no longer be served up in Bangor after Sept. 6.
For waitress Kathe Jewett, it's the only job she's held since starting work when the restaurant opened in 1966.
"It's bittersweet, but it's nothing to be sad about," the 68-year-old Jewett insisted Tuesday during a break from serving customers. "I've been here for 50 years — and it's time."
The closing will leave only one Howard Johnson restaurant, in Lake George, New York.
[More nostalgia and pictures at the link]
(Excerpt) Read more at wral.com ...
I can’t send you a PM [my account is too new], but maybe you could send me a PM: What’s your restaurant in Cary?
Thanks.
How many A&W Drive Ins are still around?
I only know of one in Paso Robles, CA.
The record was 34 seconds. My personal best was 38 (Yes, I did it MULTIPLE times, to have a personal best)
One night a buddy and I decided to try 2 in one night. We made the mistake of telling them we were going to try 2, so they brought the second ones out about 1 minute after the first ones were done. Still made it, but the afterwards wasn't much fun.
6 scoops of ice cream, 2 whole bananas and all the toppings.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Farrell%27s_Ice_Cream_Parlour
The root beer is no longer made in house.
My cousins ex wife used to work at one when she was younger. Said they'd mix up the root beer in the morning. Said it had an unheard of amount of sugar in it.
I haven't been in an A&W in ages. Root beer just isn't root beer, without sassafrass.
Used to be an A&W near Kenosha, Wi. I remember stopping in and getting a gallon on the way home.
A trip to Hartford and G Fox was a wondrous expedition. 11 floors of delight.
Glad for those memories.
Now, there is nothing to go to Hartford for. Nothing.
Honiss’ gone; chicken man on Front St gone. Brown Thomson. Sage Allen. Mr Peanut walking the street. Good stuff.
Used to be one in Madison Wi.
They had a Laundromat next door, with a doorway between the 2.
One night, after skiing up at Cascade Mountain, we stopped for dinner. While we waited for our pizza about 4 of us went for dryer rides in the industrial dryer.
Oh to be in my late 20's again.
They needed to keep the blue buildings with the orange roofs and that font. I bet you can trace the sharpest decline after that genius corporate “rebranding” they did in the 80s/90s.
-PJ
I remember their fried clams, but not fondly. I was sick for 3 days because of them.
Fifty years ago they were everywhere.
Times change and everything slips away.
It’s pretty obvious why the other Indians sent all the Patels to the US.
I remember the Howard Johnson’s on the Pennsylvania Turnpike in the 1960s. These were full-service restaurants and very busy with their location on the turnpike. Even before you got to the front door, the sound of clanging dishes and silverware being bussed served as a prelude to something big and exciting - especially for a young kid who had been riding for hours in the back seat of our Studebaker Hawk. This was certainly the place to be. Juicy hamburgers slathered with ketchup and teasing your mom by blowing bubbles in your milk glass with your straw. That was the best!
They are around still in a thin way.
One by Orangethorpe Blvd by me.
Not sure they are not all independent now.
Yeah...Howard Johnson’s may not have had great food, as others have alluded to, but...they had pretty consistent food, and there was something comfortable and familiar about it!
Hahaha...I had this vision of Forrest Gump looking over and seeing Nixon’s Plumbers at work...:)
And PB&J is not the worst way to go if you are in need of food...when I was in the USN, when I made petty officer, they gave the option of getting a chow hall pass, or money to pay your own way, and I chose the money.
I wanted to buy a camera, and saved money (Spent the rest) and a few times had nothing to eat for several weeks but Wonder Bread, margarine from a tub, and ice tea mix to drink! If I had to do that again, I would go the PB&J route, because Wonder Bread and margarine is pretty lousy!
I was in a Stuckey’s just last week, in Missouri.
One of my coworkers has family in Wisconsin and visits at least annually. He has a George Webb's t-shirt, so I assume that some of them are still open.
100%... after eating and staying in sooo many of them, i think part of it was the familiarity of them that made them feel so comfortable one more piece of Americana from our youth gone
Not I. HoJos were too expensive for our family.
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