During the California Chapter LHA meeting on January 12 at the new Nut Tree complex on I-80 in Vacaville, Fentons Creamery restaurant was presented with a Historic Lincoln Highway sign by chapter president Norm Root. It will be displayed along with artifacts and photos from one of the best-known attractions in California, The Nut Tree.
Above: Jim Braden, general manager of Fentons Creamery, receives a complimentary Historic LH sign from LHA CA chapter president Norm Root. Photo by Gary Kinst
Fentons traces back to 1894, and has been serving the San Francisco Bay Area at 4226 Piedmont Avenue since 1961. This second location opened here in 2007; it resembles a 1940s ice cream parlor with marble counters and tables, retro booths, and Art Deco lighting.
The Nut Tree was founded in 1921 as a fruit stand under the shade of a walnut tree and grew into a complex of restaurants, gift shops, entertainments, a railroad, and even an airplane runway.
Since The Nut Tree closed in 1996, locals have missed it, so redevelopment plans include nods to the attraction. At the free Nut Tree Family Park, the original Nut Tree train winds through the landscape and past the Harvest Express roller coaster, the I-80 Traffic Jammers bumper cars, California Carousel, and other custom kid rides. Click on the map below to download a large PDF version.
The childhood home of The Nut Tree founder, Harbison House, built 1906-07, has been moved 1,000 feet south to the 3.7 acre family park behind the retail complex. It is being preserved by the Vacaville Museum and will include memorabilia showing the history of the Nut Tree and California. The development also includes lodging, resdiences, offices, and even the Nut Tree Bocce Grove, a two-acre park patterned after the grand public gardens of Europe containing 8 international regulation bocce courts. Visit the Vacaville CVB for more about the Nut Tree development.
Another LHA sign dedication is planned for sometime in the next month at the Summit Garage in Altamont.
Here’s a nice chrome card of “Alpine Alpa Restaurant – Cheese Chalet” on US 30 between Massillon and Wooster. It was built by Elmer and Ethel Detweiler in 1961 and opened the next year. Note that the sign differs from the above name, calling it Alpine Alpa Cheese and Coffee Shop. A matching card shows the couple inside.
The additions to the bottom of the sign are funny now – one of them must have said, “We need to point out that we’re a Gourmet Shop.” The other replied, “And tell people we’re air conditioned too.”
A later card shows the building greatly expanded with a landscaped fountain. They announced that all 15 cheese varieties came from their own factories, with Hans and Alice Grossniklaus the cheese specialists. It had become “Ohio’s Show Place of Cheesemaking.”
The business is apparently long gone, but the nearby Alpine Homestead restaurant and Swiss market on US 62 between Wilmot and Winesburg was the inspiration for this one. According to its web site, that restaurant was built in 1935 by the Grossniklaus couple as the Alpine Alpa, 25 years before the above one. (New owners renamed it in 2002.) It’s best known for having the World’s Largest Cuckoo Clock – 23 feet tall. UPDATE: The name was just modified again to Grandma’s Alpine Homestead & Swiss Village: short history here and check the owner’s bios.
Ely’s Hotel Nevada offers 63 rooms, a casino, and a 24-hour restaurant. When the 6-story hotel opened in 1929, it was the tallest building in the state. Rooms today start at just $35.
Snow was predicted today but it was clear and bright at I drove the Lincoln Highway to the Jean Bonnet Tavern a few miles west of Bedford, Pa. The 1762 inn is at a fork of two old military paths: Forbes Road (LH/US 30) and Glades Road (PA 31). A 1928 concrete post at the intersection points out how to stay on the Lincoln.
I met Kyle Weaver, editor of my forthcoming Lincoln Highway Companion book. Also spent time with Kevin Kutz, the Lincoln Highway’s leading artist and author of a beautiful book of LH imagery. His artwork of the LH and other roadside attractions can be found in many regional shops. Here he holds his latest, a painting of Haar’s Drive-In Theater in Dillsburg, Pa.
Lunch at the inn was in the bottom-floor dining room. A huge, open fireplace kept the dimly lit room toasty. Afterward we visited the gift shop in a great-looking reconstructed log cabin just a few feet away. They stock lots of locally made products. and many regional books from Stackpole, including my The Lincoln Highway: Pennsylvania Traveler’s Guide. I picked up a jug of local syrup.
Between the two buildings is a LH interpretive panel courtesy of the LH Heritage Corridor. Next time you’re driving the Lincoln Highway in Pennsylvania, plan to stop by Jean Bonnet for lunch, browsing, and LH history.
Just a block from the official route of the Lincoln Highway in Sacramento, Suzie Burger is a new restaurant in an old gas station (see red circle on map below). The double-canopy station at 29th and P streets was previously an Orbit station, but looks like it was probably built as a Phillips 66 in the 1960s (see the Spring 2005 Society for Commercial Archeology Journal for more on their history).
The station was later converted to Tune-up Masters, then closed and declined into a local eyesore. Locals are thrilled with the rehab, though early reviews on the food are mixed (though in fairness, three months is a normal period of adjustment). The building is not listed in any historical register so the new owners are to be commended for saving, reusing, and reviving architectural details. They have other high-end restaurants in the area. The original Suzie’s drive-in at 24th Street decades ago; Benny Ogata, son of the founders of the original, is an investor and was helping cook opening day.
The Sacramento Beereports that a basic Suzie Burger is $1.95, cheeseburger $2.95, each one served with dill pickle and carrot sticks. Grilled onions, pickled jalapenos, sauerkraut, pastrami, chili, and a fried egg range from 45 cents to $1.95 each. The menu also includes hot dogs, chili, and cheesesteaks Milkshakes and soft-serve cones also are served. The cafe red-and-white color scheme includes “Suzie” caricatures by Sacramento artist Matt Rallens. The Suzie’s website has nothing yet but the address. The map is from the LHA Driving Maps CD, available through the LH Trading Post.
The front of this postcard says it all – Red Top Diner and Shell Station, Highways 24 & 30 East — City Limits, Fort Wayne, Ind.
Three train tracks can be seen behind, and the diner looks to be a converted railcar. The automobile is a mid-’30s coupe. Can’t imagine this part of the Lincoln Highway being quite so rural now. Could that be Maumee Avenue right behind the station, and E Washington Blvd in the foreground? The setting looks right and a couple business as seen in this Google aerial view at bottom center and right seem to fit the layout
Anyone know more about Red Top? The picture was taken some 70 years ago, so it’s critical to ask those who might remember before all traces and memories of such places disappear forever.
This 1940s postcard advertised Wood’s Motel & Cafe – “ultra modern and steam heat” – on US 30 South in East Evanston, Wyoming. Has any part survived to visit during the 2008 LHA conference this June?
Three large winter storms have combined to cause what is being called by the National Weather Service “easily the strongest systems to impact the West Coast this winter season and quite possibly the last few years.” The affected area stretches from San Francisco, where 1.5 million lost power, to Fernley, Nevada, east of Reno, where a half-foot of snow caused a 30-foot break in a levee wall of the Truckee Canal, releasing water 3 feet deep into town, flooding homes and stranding 3,500. US 50 has been closed at times for avalanches, and those wanting to drive it must use tire chains. Ten feet of snow is expected in the Sierra Nevadas by Sunday.
LHA president Henry Joy takes a break for fun in the high snows of the Sierras.
As the storm moved eastward Saturday, it sent whipping winds and heavy snow into parts of Utah and Colorado, prompting authorities to close major highways — including Interstate 80 east — as the National Weather Service warned that traveling in the area “will put your life at risk.”
“Do not attempt to travel in the Sierra (region) today,” the meteorological agency said in a special weather statement….
One gust near Donner Peak measured 163 miles per hour.
The New York Timesreports that I-80 was closed overnight, then reopened Saturday but tire chains were mandatory on a 60-mile stretch. Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger was even in touch with Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff.
Storms also spread across Wyoming on Thursday, causing, among other damage, the roof and walls to collapse at the Moondance Diner near Green River. The 1930s factory-built diner was moved in 2007 on a trip closely paralleling the Lincoln Highway: from near the Holland Tunnel entrance in lower Manhattan, New York City, to the small town of LeBarge, Wyoming. Read more here.
The Times Bulletin of Van Wert, Ohio, ran a nice story about Webb’s one-stop that once served travelers north of Convoy in the far western part of the state. The story focuses on Larry Webb, whose family owned it. Larry is active in the LHA and Ohio LH activities.
At left, L-R, are the owners of the business around the time of purchase: Jenny Webb (Larry’s mother), Ola Wherry (grandmother), Myron Webb (father), and Harry Wherry (grandfather). Courtesy Larry Webb
Webb’s Hi-Speed Service Station, Restaurant, and Tourist Cabins actually had opened in 1931 under different owners, then in 1946, Webb’s parents and grandparents bought the business. They lived in the restaurant building along with Larry and his sister. When the road was widened in the 1960s, it took out the pumps, and with business already declining, they closed. The cabins are gone too, but the garage remains as does the restaurant, now a private home at the corner of Lincoln Highway and Convoy-Heller Road.
Remember those great gift shops and souvenir stands with all kinds of wacky stuff to buy? And how little (if anything) your parents let you get?? Well you’re grown up — you can stop now and stock up. BUT WAIT! Where’d they all go? Yes, very few survive, so when you do see one, it’s even more important you stop — to satisfy your souvenir craving and to help keep the place in business.
Thankfully in the 20 years I’ve been stopping at Mister Ed’s Elephant Museum, it’s only gotten BETTER. Ed Gotwalt received his first elephant as a wedding gift in 1967 and began collecting anything related to the animal. When his collection outgrew the house, he opened a general store to display them. The current location has old-fashioned candy, wacky new candy creations, elephant-themed gifts, and of course, roasted peanuts. The museum holds more than 6,000 elephant collectibles. (Miss Ellie, the talking elephant outisde, says 4,000 in the video below, but I think they forget to tell her the most recent figure.)
Mister Ed’s is located at 6019 Chambersburg Road (between old and new Lincoln Highway routes) between Gettysburg and Chambersburg. It’s open daily 10 am – 5 pm, and admission is FREE.
Try out this video — my first on YouTube! — taken in October with my still digital camera’s video option. It’s only 20 seconds long but you’ll hear the fiberglass Miss Ellie Phant talk a bit about the place.
Click the map above for a full-size view of the Lincoln Highway.
Like this blog? You'll LOVE my books!Lincoln Highway Companion features detailed maps and places to eat and stay. Click the book to buy it on Amazon.
Click the Greetings book below to purchase the ultimate guide to the history and route of the Lincoln Highway!
Another fun book! The Ship Hotel: A Grand View along the Lincoln Highway recalls the greatest roadside attraction along the coast-to-coast road.
And for those who LOVE diners, click the book below to purchase our completely updated guide to the history, geography, and food of Pennsylvania's Diners!
Ely’s 
The Times Bulletin of Van Wert, Ohio, ran a 
Lincoln Highway News 