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Boonville —
For the first time in its 50-year existence, the lights inside Bobber Cafe were dark an entire day earlier this year, when harsh winter weather prevented employees from opening.
The closure proved to be an augury of the restaurant's ultimate fate.
The Bobber had once been a truck stop eatery open all day, each day — even on holidays. It served classic American cuisine, like waffles and chicken fried steak, and succeeded in attracting drivers in transit across the country, local afternoon coffee drinkers and teenagers seeking a meal late at night.
On Monday, management informed employees the restaurant would close for the final time Labor Day.
"We're kind of out of place, out of time," manager Keith Walters said. "It doesn't fit with things going in restaurants anymore."
The business started as The Windmill when cars first traveled along a newly built Interstate 70 expansion cutting through mid-Missouri in the early '60s. While it had been the only truck stop between Columbia and Kansas City, the restaurant saw its monopoly fade. Businesses catering to truckers, offering food and gas, opened near the highway.
Walters said business ran parallel to the rest of the economy and began a more steady decline when the recession started in late 2007. The restaurant stopped serving a third shift a few years ago, locking its doors at 9 p.m., as the night time jaunt became less profitable.
"Most people still think we are really busy, and we are, but we're a really large place, so it takes a lot more to run this than a little hole in the wall," Walters said.
Myrl Solomon opened The Windmill, a service station and restaurant, in May 1961 in the space the convenience store and a few booths now fill. He sold it in May 1985, and the new owners increased the size of the dining room and added a banquet area.
"If we were half the size, we would still be open," Walters said.
Nancy Ward, Solomon's daughter, said he envisioned the business as the only truck stop between St. Louis and Kansas City.
"He wanted to be open for the truckers whenever they might come through," Ward said. "I can't even remember when we first closed for Christmas Day, but we had to put a padlock on because we couldn't find a key." (The restaurant did not close for the entire day, serving dinner on Christmas nights.)
For the first time in its 50-year existence, the lights inside Bobber Cafe were dark an entire day earlier this year, when harsh winter weather prevented employees from opening.
The closure proved to be an augury of the restaurant's ultimate fate.
The Bobber had once been a truck stop eatery open all day, each day — even on holidays. It served classic American cuisine, like waffles and chicken fried steak, and succeeded in attracting drivers in transit across the country, local afternoon coffee drinkers and teenagers seeking a meal late at night.
On Monday, management informed employees the restaurant would close for the final time Labor Day.
"We're kind of out of place, out of time," manager Keith Walters said. "It doesn't fit with things going in restaurants anymore."
The business started as The Windmill when cars first traveled along a newly built Interstate 70 expansion cutting through mid-Missouri in the early '60s. While it had been the only truck stop between Columbia and Kansas City, the restaurant saw its monopoly fade. Businesses catering to truckers, offering food and gas, opened near the highway.
Walters said business ran parallel to the rest of the economy and began a more steady decline when the recession started in late 2007. The restaurant stopped serving a third shift a few years ago, locking its doors at 9 p.m., as the night time jaunt became less profitable.
"Most people still think we are really busy, and we are, but we're a really large place, so it takes a lot more to run this than a little hole in the wall," Walters said.
Myrl Solomon opened The Windmill, a service station and restaurant, in May 1961 in the space the convenience store and a few booths now fill. He sold it in May 1985, and the new owners increased the size of the dining room and added a banquet area.
"If we were half the size, we would still be open," Walters said.
Nancy Ward, Solomon's daughter, said he envisioned the business as the only truck stop between St. Louis and Kansas City.
"He wanted to be open for the truckers whenever they might come through," Ward said. "I can't even remember when we first closed for Christmas Day, but we had to put a padlock on because we couldn't find a key." (The restaurant did not close for the entire day, serving dinner on Christmas nights.)
Customers filed into the Bobber Monday afternoon and learned of restaurant's demise from their waitresses.
Carl Morrison, a Boonville mechanic, and his wife Barbara Morrison, a secretary at their business, eat lunch everyday at Bobber. They celebrated a surprise birthday party for Carl at the restaurant, and Barbara said she's attended a number of showers there.
I asked them where they plan to eat lunch now. Another customer suggested some catfish restaurants recently opened in Boonville. Barbara said "you can't eat catfish everyday."
Employees say the steadiest of Bobber customers often make three to four coffee trips inside the restaurant daily. Walters, who started managing the restaurant in 1993, said when the restaurant stayed open all night, there were days when he worked all three shifts and served some of the same customers in each one.
"It could be 20, 30 minutes in between (visits) and they are back in here," said Christene Davis, a waitress who has worked at Bobber for eight years.
The owners, Albert Schlueter and Melvin King of St. Louis and Sullivan, respectively, purchased The Windmill and converted it into the Bobber. They operated five other truck stops in the Midwest. The Bobber is the last one to close.
Walters said you see vacant truck stops at exits in each direction on Interstate 70.
"This was probably their favorite restaurant of all of them," Walters said.
Paul Wunderlich, a retired conservation agent for the state of Missouri, has eaten at the restaurant for three decades and awaited his usual group of farmers and retirees to join him Monday.
He wasn't surprised when he learned the restaurant planned to close — he noticed a sign advertising 50 percent off inside the convenience store — and sees its closure as an indication of a "fundamental change in the way things operate."
"These type of real coffee cup places are becoming a thing of the past," Wunderlich said.
