Golden Bear

Apr 11, 2012 09:26

On March 29, a local restaurant, Woodfire Chicken, closed, in part, perhaps even in large part, due to on-going construction on Lake-Cook Road. We've been going to the restaurant for years, although usually my family refers to it by a different name, which really annoys Elaine, since it is a name that hasn't been on the restaurant since 1984.

Sometime in the late 1960s or early 1970s, the building the restaurant stood in was built to house a Golden Bear Pancake House. This was a chain of 17 restaurants (there is another one in Niles, currently occupied by Goodi's Reastaurant) based out of Mount Prospect and founded in 1961. In 1973, the chain was bought by Montgomery Ward's, which was bought by Mobil Oil a year later.

Although Golden Bear was mostly a breakfast restaurant, they also served lunch and dinner. Their napkins included the words to a jingle, "Golden Bear, Golden Bear, it’s a honey of a place where food is fun," along with a picture of their mascot (a golden bear with a stack of pancakes, clever, right?).

In 1984, Mobil divested themselves of Golden Bear by selling the chain, then 45 restaurants strong, to Pizza Hut, because that's just what Chicago needs, more chain pizza parlors. Even in 1984 when the restaurant rebranded itself, I wondered why I would want to buy a chain pizza when I could easily get pizza from Nancy's, or Jake's, or any of numerous other local pizzerias that actually serve one of the three varieties of Chicago pizza. (Good, Better, and Best, for those keeping track).*

I'm not sure how long the Pizza Hut existed on Lake Cook Road. It is the only incarnation of that building I didn't frequent. Eventually, they closed and reopened as Full Slab Ribs, which my family always referred to as "That Restaurant, Where Golden Bear Used to Be." The owners eventually decided to expand their menu and changed the name to "Woodfire Chicken," which was always simply "Let's go to Golden Bear."**

And now it is a vacant building again. According to the landlord, there are two (unnamed) restaurants interested in moving into the spot. I hope one of them does. I hope it is a locally owned place. And I know that when it opens, I'll refer to it as Golden Bear.

*Pizza hut converted the Golden Bears, just as they did to the Sambo's restaurants they had also acquired.

**Elaine is also annoyed that I refer to Baker's Square, where I used to work, as Poppin' Fresh Pies, even though the name changed before I worked there. And the Aon Building, which is her company, although she doesn't work in the building, as the Standard Oil Building or Big Stan. I don't like name changes.
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