I was saddened
to hear the news the other day that the last existing Howard Johnson’s
restaurant, located in Lake George, NY, had closed its doors forever. So as a
tribute, I am reprinting an article I wrote about HoJo’s nearly 20 years ago,
when there still were ten restaurants left.
I MISS YOU, HOWARD!
I know I’m probably not alone when I say this, but I really miss all of the bright orange roofs of the Howard Johnson restaurants whenever I travel now.
Back in the ‘60s and ‘70s, the highlight of any of my journeys, especially after riding for hours on endless, boring stretches of highway, was seeing one of those orange roofs up ahead. For one thing, it meant yummy ice cream (of which I became intimately acquainted with every flavor) scooped into fancy sugar cones, not those flimsy, run-of-the-mill, flat-bottomed waffle cones that tasted like Styrofoam.
It also meant chicken pot pie. For some reason, I became hooked on Howard Johnson’s chicken pot pie. If we stopped at a Howard Johnson’s three times in one day, I’d order chicken pot pie all three times. I never grew tired of it, even when the crust occasionally was a tad on the soggy side or the cubes of chicken were a little rubbery. I still cleaned my plate.
But alas, over the years, those familiar orange-roofed buildings slowly began to disappear and fast-food joints popped up in their places. I guess it was because busy motorists no longer wanted to waste precious time stopping to order a sit-down meal. They preferred places where the employees would be standing outside and flinging food at them as they sped past at 65 miles per hour.
So all I have left now are memories of my favorite Howard Johnsons. I was fortunate to grow up in an area of NH where there were three of them within a 25-mile radius – Manchester, Hooksett and Concord. My husband and I made a point of eating at all three on a regular, rotating basis, so they each would receive equal time from us. During those visits, there were a few memorable moments that made us laugh.
I’ll never forget, for example, the night an elderly man was upset because the cook had burned his grilled-cheese sandwich. The waitress, in her starched blue and orange uniform, apologized and took it back, but the second sandwich looked even worse than the first one.
“That does it!” the man shouted, pounding his fist on the counter. “I demand to see Howard! And I’m not leaving here until I do!”
Everyone within earshot started to giggle. The poor waitress, not wanting to further upset the man, struggled to keep a straight face as she explained that Howard Johnson wasn’t on the premises. But the poor old man was adamant about speaking to Howard. In fact, he still was sitting there waiting for him when we left.
Whenever I needed a quick, pot-pie fix, we usually went the HoJo’s in Hooksett because it the closest to where we lived. But on one particular night, an unfamiliar odor hit us when we walked in. It honestly smelled as if something had died in there.
“What’s that smell?” I wrinkled my nose and asked the waitress after we were seated. I secretly prayed it wasn’t the evening’s special.
“Don’t worry, it’s not the food!” she said brightly, laughing. “The septic system is just backed up!”
Somehow, that didn’t make us feel a whole lot better.
The Howard Johnson’s near the Queen City Bridge in Manchester also had a very distinct odor…strong bleach. That’s because it was attached to a motor inn that had a heated pool that must have had a couple tons of chlorine dumped into it.
But hey, at least it was better than Hooksett’s septic-tank smell.
The only thing I didn’t like about the Howard Johnson restaurants that were located right off major highways was they attracted buses. It seemed as if every time we pulled into one of the parking lots, a busload of tourists would be right on our bumper.
“Quick! Run!” my husband would shout at me as he leapt out of the car and bolted toward the restaurant’s door so he could beat the crowd.
But by the time I
gathered my coat and my handbag, checked my hair in the car mirror and applied
a fresh coat of lipstick, we inevitably would end up standing in line behind
about 75 people, most of whom were engaged in conversations that sounded
something like this:
“Hey, Martha, do you want raspberry ice cream?”
“Nah…I’m really
not in the mood for raspberry. What other flavors do they have?”
“Chocolate…strawberry…vanilla…coffee…maple walnut…pistachio…”
(All 28 flavors later)…“I guess I’ll have the butter pecan.”
“Do you want sprinkles on that?”
“What kind of sprinkles do they have?”
By then, my husband’s expression clearly would be telling me that if looks could kill, I’d have been in an urn sitting on the mantel.
At one time, there were over a thousand Howard Johnson restaurants in the USA, most of them along the East Coast. Now there are only 10. Someone recently told me there’s one in Springfield, Vermont. Heck, that’s only about an hour-and-a-half drive from here.
So the next time my husband asks me where I want to go for dinner, I hope he has plenty of gas in his car.
I can taste that chicken
pot pie already.
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Sally Breslin is an award-winning syndicated humor columnist who has written regularly for newspapers and magazines all of her adult life. She is the author of several novels in a variety of genres, from humor and romance to science fiction. Contact her at: sillysally@att.net
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