The American City Diner was one of the first “retro” styled diners. It was built by Kullman Diners in 1988. You can see photos of diner shortly after installation here.
These photos were taken by my father, Michael G. Stewart, shortly after the diner opened for business. Since then, the entire left hand side of the diner has been covered, and the interior has been cluttered with retro knick-knacks.

A similar view of what the diner looks like today. Truly unfortunate.

The Alexandria Diner started out life in 1969 as a Howard Johnson’s Restaurant. In 2000, the restaurant was remodeled into a retro-diner style. These photos date from just after it re-opened. By 2011, nothing was left but a hole in the ground.

I’ve managed to dig up a photo of the interior of the Potomac Diner, formerly of Hagerstown, Maryland, which answers the question, “factory or home-built?”. Strangely remodeled Brill with a dining room addition off the side? Re-purposed trolley? Two-by-fours and some nails? The pictures lead me to believe it was definitely an on site job, and a pretty quirky one at that.

Yes, it has a barrel roof, so it’s going for that “true” diner look, but look at the way it’s executed. Shallow, and with huge beams on the inside of the ceiling to give the curve. Voila- barrel roof on the cheap that you could build in your back yard. The stools have skinny, tall bases and thin, flat tops like you would see on a ’20s stool, but with later style tube backs. The Waffle Shop in Washington DC had similar stool tops. The counter also looks like an early piece. The diner opened in 1942, so maybe that counter was a salvage/second hand piece from somewhere else? The entire thing reminds me of early home-built lunch wagons, but on a much larger scale.

The diner had a mirrored back wall and jukebox system. Floorplan is classic diner, and while it does have booths, the interior space between the stools and booths seems extremely tight.

The Fleetwood Diner opened in Hagerstown, Maryland in 1938. Looks like a secondhand 1920s model, but it’s hard to be positive- O’Mahony was advertising a very similar model as late as the early 1940s. It was attached to a Fleetwood gas staion at 1000 (later 1004) West Washington St.

By 1945, it was Trucker’s Diner. Its name changed to the West Washington St. Diner in 1947, and closed in 1961.

I first came across Dinette Diner in 2007, when there was an auction for one of their original advertising pamphlets on ebay. I didn’t win the auction but saved the (low quality) images and promptly forgot about them. Mike Engle turned me back on to Dinette Diner a couple of weeks ago and I started researching. A lot of my research overlaps with his, so big credit goes his way. This is also still very much a work in progress- so readers, if you know anything about this company, I’d love to hear it. Lastly, there are some great photos out there that I have linked to, so be sure to check them out. Without further ado- Dinette Diner.

The Dinette Diner Company was a subsidiary of Spillman Manufacturing, a North Tonawanda, New York firm which made carousels. They launched their line of “Dinette Diners” in 1930, opening their prototype at 107 Main St., North Tonawanda.
Shortly after, they opened a second diner on 42nd St., New York City. A separate Dinette Diner corporation was organized nearby with offices in the Bowery Bank Building, 110 east 42nd, New York. They hired on Mr. C.A. Dann, “a man who has probably sold more dining cars than any one individual in the country” as the sales manager for the company.

The styling of their diners was very unusual for the time period, and their construction methods and materials were somewhat unconventional. What may jump out at you immediately is the exterior- it doesn’t look like a diner. Where’s the enamel? Where’s the stainless? Where’s the barrel or monitor roof? No, instead of streamline moderne, “the structure is of the English cottage type with a roof of variegated autumn shades with heavy rolled eaves. The exterior walls are of grey stained shingles. The windows, beautiful indeed, are of the cottage casement type, opening out, and with diamond ground design.”

The interior had much more of a standard diner look about it, but with what was, for the time, a huge width. Like Bixler and Rochester Grills, Dinette Diners built their diners in four foot “slices”, which were shipped in a box car or truck to the site. As such, they could be wide enough for booths, and the length of the diner was not limited by transportation. This idea had been done before, by the Fremont Metal Body Company, a precursor to Bixler, as early 1925. But it still represented a huge technical advantage over what was coming out the big factories of the day.

The interior walls and floors were covered in linoleum, with a barrel vault ceiling, with beams at each of the section seams. Interior woodwork was gumwood with a walnut stain.
“The Dinette has seating capacity for 30 persons, 14 at the counter and 16 at the end and side tables. The tables are of walnut with two tone “Lino” tops having brown centers and jasper green borders. The chairs have hat racks, green leather upholstered seats and are of the low back design.
The counter is of table height with a wide overhang on the front edge so that one sits close to the eating top without having to bend over to his food. The counter is raised off the floor by porcelain legs, providing plenty of toe room underneath. One sits at the counter exactly as is customary at one’s own table. No balancing on foot rests or hunched up limbs. In addition this type of counter is the last word in sanitation, permitting free circulation of air and eliminating the usual dirt and vermin traps. The counter stools have apple green porcelain bases with green leather upholsterd tops. The front of the counter is finished in “Formica” panels of ivory with contrasting pillars and trim in modernistic color and design.
Between the ceiling and the roof is a 30 inch air space, ventilators opening into it from the ceiling and a heavy duty exhaust fan at one end which ensures freedom from steam or odors- the air in the Dinette, by means of the above sysstem is completely changed every three minutes.”

Here is their prototype, from 1929-1930, which opened at 107 Main St., North Tonawanda, NY. A crisp photo of it, taken in 1941, can be found here. In the following years, an entrance was added to the left hand side, and it appears the center door was “deleted” In 1958, it moved to 346 River Road, North Tonawanda to make room for a new grocery store. In 1974, it changed to the Riverview Tavern. It is still at that location, operating as the Niagra River Yacht club, though it has been remodeled almost beyond recognition.

Another Dinette Diner was delivered to Sandusky, Ohio in 1939. It was opened by Fred W. May, who died a year later at the age of 74. The diner changed ownership and names, and operated as Hilda’s Diner or Hilda’s Dinette until 1962, when it was moved to River Avenue, Sandusky, and then to Fremont, Ohio. Some clear interior photos can be found here.

Some parting thoughts: Dinette Diner Company was building diners for the better part of a decade, so who knows how many they actually produced? Part of the issue is identification. Even as a diner-geek, if I were to have walked by one of these before this research, I wouldn’t recognize it as a diner. In restored to brand-new condition, I may give it a second glance, but I would never peg it as anything special from the outside. And then you start having remodelings over the years, like with the Tonawanda location in the ’40s/’50s , and even if you know what you’re looking for, it gets muddy. And then further renovation, like the current state of the Tonawanda location, and it’s all but impossible.

Dinette Diner was playing the environmental game of the ’60s/’70s thirty or more years before it came back into vogue. They were trying to outclass “dining car” builders by making their product more elegant, and at the same time more technologically advanced. Bigger, better, cleaner and more cozy.
Think of a 1960s diner in the same regard. More sections, wider, longer, better kitchen equipment. In so many ways more modern, but covered in stone, mansard roofs, and lit by wagon wheel chandeliers. Just like Diner Dinette, trying to revolutionize the diner industry while distancing themselves from the diner image.

Two more, courtesy Sandusky History http://sanduskyhistory.blogspot.com/2009/08/mays-dinette.html

Sterling Streamliners were made by the J.B. Judkins Company of Merrimac, MA. They built diners from 1936 to 1942.

Dowling’s Flyer – 1865 E. Tremont Ave, Bronx, NY – This is the first I’ve seen of this one. Does anyone have any more information on this location?

Jimmie Evans Flyer – Pleasant Street Opposite Post Office – Rt 6. New Bedford MA. Still with us, but just barely.

Lindholm’s – Rutland, VT. An interior photo when the diner was still operational. I think Colin Strayer may have this one up in Ontario.

Penn State Flyer – Opened in Allentown, PA in 1941. Moved to Scranton, PA in 1956

Schanaker’s Streamline Diner – Elmira, NY – 1941

Simpson’s Dining Car – 1415 Main St. Houston, TX. Simpson’s had been replaced by the 1950s, but it looks like the newer model retained the built-in-sign from the Sterling Streamliner. Photo– photo source

Yankee Flyer – 236 Main St. Nashua, NH – Built 1939- the first Streamliner Model. More information, including a vintage photo and a mural of the diner can be found on Larry Cultrera’s Diner Hotline.

The Dutch Diner, a 1950s Silk City, was located at 501 East Main Street, Palmyra, PA. It had an extensive dining room addition out the back, and a large arrow diner sign.

Looking at GoogleMaps (what a great tool), there may still be something there. The diner sign is instantly recognizable, though now it reads “Pet HQ”. The dining room additions are also recognizable from the post card.

The diner portion itself it a bit more questionable. What’s there is of the right dimensions, and has a vestibule in the same location of the same size and shape, but the entire place has been roofed and sided over. If the diner is still inside, which it wouldn’t surprise me in the slightest if that’s the case, I’d bet you dollars to donuts that there’s nothing but the shell, and that it’s probably all but unrecognizable at that.

On to the second possibility for today, the Wallingford Diner of 47-1/2 North Colony Street, Wallingford, CT. Again, the building that’s there is in the right place, with the right shape, right proportions, door in the middle, door on the end. False deco-facade on the end that’s clearly not part of the building proper. It was opened by at least 1929.

The Wallingford diner was sold in May 1937 ( story 02), in 1962, by which point the streets had been re-numbered and the address was 45 N. Colony St.

Then again, it could be an entirely unrelated bar, but with all the re-numbering, and possibly the move of the diner from parallel to perpendicular with the road, it’s hard to say for sure.

The Silver Castle chain was another White-Castle-esque hamburger chain, one of the many that popped up in the ’20s and ’30s. Think White Tower, Little Tavern, Krystal, etc. According to this source, Silver Castle was founded in 1936 and had locations throughout OK and TX.

The interior shot, with its barrel roof, looks very much like factory built diners of the time, and rather unlike the squat castle-shaped building pictured on the restaurant china on the link. Some White Tower locations were built by Valentine, like this one, formerly in NJ. In this era, even Kullman got in on the game, producing a castle-turret styled dinette to cash in on the rising popularity of such establishments. The question is- is this Silver Castle location- shop no. 13- an on site construction with styling influenced by what was coming out of the diner factories of the time? Or did they contract their construction out?