Halfway diner
The Halfway Diner , sometimes called Village Diner or Historic Village Diner called, is a restaurant on North Broadway ( US 9 ), one block from the intersection with New York State Route 199 in Red Hook , in Dutchess County in the state of New York . When it was entered on the National Register of Historic Places in 1988, it was the first diner in New York and the fourth in the United States to receive cultural monument status . In front of the building is a New York State Historic Monument plaque.
With the chrome parts on the facade and the curved walls, the design reflects the era in which such restaurants were designed similar to dining cars in railroad trains. The building was in two other places in its history.
building
The diner is in the center of a 23m x 38m lot in central Red Hook. There is a Queen Anne-style house to the south , a small shop to the north and the Elmendorph Inn on the other side of Cherry Street, also on the National Register of Historic Places . There are many homes from the 19th century on North Broadway. The area in front of and behind the house serves as a parking space.
The building itself sits on a foundation made of cast stone . The facade is made of stainless steel and rounded at the corners. The construction is based on a steel frame. The windows are rectangular and foldable and reach high up the walls. The glazed door on the south side is arranged centrally. The features of the building are thus reminiscent of a railway dining car.
There is a red neon sign with the word DINER on the roof . The main entrance is not in the middle of the structure, but further south, as the diner has expanded over time. A rear wing was also added later and has a facade clad with polyvinyl chloride panels. This part takes up part of the kitchen and extends to the west.
The interior also takes on the appearance of a dining car, as the tables are placed in boxes on the walls on the east and west sides; they are separated from each other by a single central aisle. The ceiling arches over it. In the rear part there is a bar and the kitchen, there are no windows, which means that this section of the building deviates from the typical look of a diner.
Much of the interior has been preserved in its original condition, such as the tiled floor and paneling in turquoise and black, the cream-colored walls and the laminated counter with sixteen bar stools and a back wall clad in ribbed metal in the kitchen area. The original clock made by Seth Thomas is still hanging on the north wall of the guest room. These facilities are geared more towards use and are therefore more typical of a snack bar than of a lavishly furnished dining car of the time. In the rear wing, the dining area is more open, the tables and chairs are partially free. The doors to the toilets are in their original condition.
history
Diners have developed from their origins as horse-drawn dining cars at the beginning of the 20th century to stationary, but not permanently built-in restaurants that have found their place in the cityscape of the northeastern states. The increasing use of the automobile in the 1920s for travel from city to city ensured that such diners could also be found in the country. The manufacturers offered prefabricated constructions and also provided buyers with training on how to run such restaurants. This made it possible for start-ups to open restaurants with less capital than was usually necessary.
Lou Dubois from Kingston , on the Red Hook opposite bank of the Hudson River , bought one of the best-selling prefabricated constructions in 1925, a Silk City Diner produced by the Paterson Vehicle Company, one of the leading manufacturers of such for diners at the time. He decided to have the pub set up on Albany Post Road , which had recently become part of US Highway 9 , just north of Astor Flats , which was part of Rhinebeck . He called it the Halfway Diner because it was about halfway between New York City and Albany . The actual midpoint of the route between the two cities along US 9 is Hyde Park , about 15 km further south. Dubois's wife ran the diner while her husband continued to drive trucks for a beer merchant.
When Lou Dubois died in 1928, his family sold the diner to Bert Coons. He first moved it to its current location. When the Taconic State Parkway was completed in northern Dutchess County's post World War II , he moved the diner further east to property near the point where New York State Route 199 intersected the new road in order to get off the new road Benefit from traffic habits. It is not clear whether he changed the name of the diner when he moved.
When some of the traffic returned to Red Hook with the completion of the Kingston-Rhinecliff Bridge in 1957 , Coons brought the diner back to its current location. He rented it out to others and eventually sold the diner in the 1960s, having already added on, to use it more like a traditional inn. A new sign on the roadside had the new name - Village Restaurant.
Remarks
- ↑ New York State Monument Plaque on the roadside by the restaurant.
- ↑ a b c d e f g Neil Larson: National Register of Historic Places nomination, Halfway Diner . New York State Office of Parks, Recreation and Historic Preservation . October 1987. Retrieved June 10, 2009.
- ↑ 2007 Traffic Data Report for New York State ( English , PDF) New York State Department of Transportation . Pp. 91-100, 350. July 25, 2008. Retrieved June 17, 2009.
Web links
Coordinates: 41 ° 59 ′ 48 ″ N , 73 ° 52 ′ 27 ″ W.