Old diners are a taste of nostalgia

Posted by Bill on Monday, October 29, 2007   |   No Comments

Several months ago I wrote about what I called travel collecting. The post explored the fascination some of us have with “collecting” (visiting or photographing) in the course of our travels. Old diners make a great addition to travel collections. Not only are they fun to visit, colorful and nostalgic, they’re a great way to rub elbows with the locals and get a taste of obscure facts about the places you’re visiting.

So what is a diner and what makes it different from a regular roadside restaurant? “A restaurant in the shape of a railroad car” is a standard definition. The word “diner” comes, of course, from “dining car.” Many believe that all diners were salvaged from actual rolling stock and resurrected as unique eateries. True, some began life as railroad cars or trolleys, but most were built as diners in the first place.

Many diners make ample use of stainless inside and out—along with chrome-stemmed swiveling stools, often topped with a red upholstered seat. In fact, a counter and stools bolted to the floor are hallmarks of the diner. Diners are usually long and narrow. Menu items and prices are other clues: “A diner serves unpretentious, home-cooked meals for a reasonable price and is generally family-owned and operated,” some say. Other students of diners insist, “If it doesn’t serve breakfast anytime, it’s not a diner.”

The diner actually evolved from the enterprising efforts of Walter Scott, a pressman, type compositor and entrepreneur from Providence, Rhode Island. Seventeen-year-old Scott added to his income by selling sandwiches and coffee to night workers at the newspaper.

By 1872, business was booming, and Scott quit his printing job, bought a covered express wagon and a horse to pull it and began selling food at night. In so doing, he unwittingly provided the inspiration for what would become an American icon—the diner.

As the popularity of diners grew, they became so abundant that many towns and cities passed ordinances regulating the hours they could operate. To get around such restrictions, some owners positioned their wagons as semi-permanent locations. The rise of electric street cars also played a big role in this trend, and many obsolete horse-drawn street cars were purchased and pressed into service as food venues.

Since this could be done at a fraction of the cost of building new diners, lots of would-be restaurateurs jumped into the business. Struggling to make ends meet, many failed to maintain their diners, and in time many customers shunned them as greasy spoons and a haven for unsavory characters.

By building in elements of the railroad car and using the word “diner,” manufacturers slowly began to change the image the old dining cars. Diners were popular in the Depression because they were inexpensive. By the 1930s and 1940s, busses began to replace old streetcars and interurbans, providing another low-cost conversion opportunity for the old vehicles. Diners were very popular after World War II, and the 1950s saw the introduction of many modern improvements—stainless steel, AC and better lighting. By the late 60s and early 70s, Americans began to show renewed interest in classic diners—perhaps as a reaction to the proliferation of fast-food outlets.

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