Breakfast at Needful Things. This lunch counter was formerly a J.J. Newberry. The building was built in the 1850s and became a Newberry’s five and dime in the ’30s. It looks like the lunch counter dates from around that time, with pieces updated and modernized over the years. I had the sausage gravy on biscuits. Nicely golden brown toasted biscuits, and as much sausage as gravy on top. A great start to the day, and a real step back in time.

It is located at 218 W. Washington Street, Charles Town, WV.
Here’s their website: http://www.needfulthings-website.com/

The Triangle Diner is still undergoing restoration. Since last I visited, lots of work has been done, the biggest visual changes are an addition to the kitchen annex and the re-installation of the restored sign.
See their website here: http://www.mikestrianglediner.com/site/

Just around the corner from the triangle, some old plastic signs. RCA, Zenith, Sylvania.

Cloverleaf. I wonder what the neon on it originally read?

Rock of Ages. A few years back I visited their quarry.

The former Piccadilly Grill. Possibly a replacement for the ’30s O’Mahony diner, the Piccadilly Diner, which would have been located within a door or two. The Grill looks like a ’50s lunch counter in the spirit of White Tower or the Snow White Grill, just down the road. Single row of stools, cooking done behind the counter. It’s now called ‘Just Like Grandma’s’.
It is located at 46 East Piccadilly Street Winchester, VA

The Snow White Grill. I’ve done several other posts on this one, please refer to them for full interior and exterior shots. Built 1949, the Snow White Grill chain originally had locations throughout northern VA, WV, and MD. Today, this is the only one that still bears the Snow White Name. Someday I’ll make it to the other Snow White Grill, today operating as the Blue White, in Martinsburg, VA. It was nice to see the Snow White doing booming business. Every stool was filled, as were all the patio tables, not to mention all the carryout traffic.

The Snow White Grill is located at 159 North Loudoun Street Winchester, VA

A new addition to the collection. Probably from the ’90s retro / diner craze. Looks like a pretty blatant steal of the diner on the front cover of John Baeder’s book, “Diners”. But nice illustration, and I love the border.

Little Tavern drawings based off some late ’70s slides John Baeder sent me last week.

To all the mothers, sons and daughters out there- Happy Mothers Day!

My mother at the Lincoln Diner, Gettysburg, PA.

Kevin Patrick will be checking this one out at some point to see what, if anything, is left inside. Formerly the Leigh Diner of Union, NJ, now Garden Buffet.
1181 Morris Avenue Union Township, NJ 07083

Another one that’s still hanging in there- barely- under layers of renovation.
The black and gold matchbook shows an older diner, replaced by the one in the interior shot.

Formerly Al’s Broadway Diner, now El Conde Steak House. Broadway and East 184th, NYC.

Another in the seemingly endless series of bad remodeling through the decades. This time, it’s Jerry and Bert’s of Painesville, Ohio, which got the mansard and cupola treatment over its original moderne glass brick and enamel panel facade.

This Silk City diner opened in 1955 at the corner of Carlisle St. and W. Railroad St, Gettysburg PA. It was originally called the Varsity Diner. Business must have been booming, because just five years later, in 1960, two dining rooms were added, boosting the seating by 130. As the announcement for the dining rooms says that the one pictured is the “first-floor” dining room, I assume there must have also been one in the basement.

By 1969, the diner had become George Grawe’s Cannon Cafeteria. A color postcard of the dining room of the diner from this era can be found here. It didn’t last long as the Cannon, and by 1971, it had again changed names, to the Lincoln Diner.

Over the years, the diner and its dining room addition had been encased in environmental style remodeling. In 1995 the decision was made to bring the diner back to a more 1950s look, and stainless and neon were added over top of the previous work. The photo with the motorcycle was taken just after the new stainless work was completed. The last two shots are as it appears now.

I was sent the second and fourth photos by Jane Lunden, whose grandfather, T. Fred Dowling, formerly owned this diner. The barrel roofed model was replaced by a double ended Sterling Streamliner, possibly a secondhand diner from Connecticut. It stayed in the family through the 1960s, at which point it was sold. After that, it’s unclear what became of the diner, other than that the site is now home to car repair businesses.
The first photo is from the NYPL collections, and shows the barrel roof model in a different color scheme.

If anyone has any further information on this diner, its history, or when it was demolished, please contact me.

A tragically redone c.1948 diner at the intersection of Webster and 182nd in NYC.

Bronx had the second lowest number of diners of the five boroughs in New York City. Based on Sanborne maps, “Diner” magazine and other sources, I have counted ‘only’ 72 diners. Now you know how Tierney and O’Mahony were building a diner a day in the 1920s!
Taking inspiration from Spencer Stewart’s two recent finds in New York city, I went through my Bronx list posted on nydiners.com in the New York In Depth site.
Papa John’s Diner, the original name, came up on a google search in one of the comments from
http://forgotten-ny.com/2009/12/belmont-bronx/
There was a picture of Joe’s Cafe on the site, recognizable by the vertical flutes, even if they were painted over. A quick search on google maps shows just a car wash on the site. In an inglorious demise, the owners took the diner and turned it into a car wash. But if you look on the far end, there are still vertical flutes on the building.