LD FOODIES BUT GOODIES

A REVIEW OF CLASSIC LOCAL RESTAURANTS FROM BYGONE ERAS
BY BRANDON YIP, CONTRIBUTOR

  
   
   
   
 
 
  
 
  
  
 
 
 
 
  
 
  

Traces of old school restaurant relics from the Lower Mainland’s past are difficult to find. Locally, near
the Douglas College New Westminster campus, students can fuel up their brains before classes

at the Waffle House Restaurant at 636 Sixth Street, which has been serving customers since
1954. Other than the odd gem here and there, not many classic vintage restaurants are left.

Over the past few years, some of the oldest restaurants in Vancouver shut
their doors. Tops Restaurant at 2790 Kingsway closed down in August 2016
after 44 years. Back in December, the iconic Nick’s Spaghetti House, located
at 631 Commercial Drive, served their final meatball after 62 years. Nick’s
was one of the last remaining links to Commercial Drive's developing Italian
community back in the 1950s. Owner Nick Felicella opened his establishment
as a tiny coffee shop back in 1955. He later expanded and converted it
into a pasta restaurant that East Vancouverites would soon come to love and come back to for decades.

Remarkably, Wally’s Burgers is one of the last remaining classic burger joints from a long-gone era. It first
opened back in 1962 by Wally Stritzel, an Austrian immigrant who took over the business when it was another
burger place called Harvey's. The original location at 2703 Kingsway would become a landmark institution for
teenagers, hot rods, cruisers, burger cravers, and milkshake lovers for decades. Drivers heading east or west
along Kingsway could not miss the restaurant's unique three-storey high red and green neon sign. But in
the 1970s, Stritzel sold the business, though the name Wally’s remained. In a March 2008 interview with The
Vancouver Sun, Hermann Stritzel, Wally’s brother, explained the reasoning why Wally sold the business.

“He sold out as soon as McDonald's started building up,” Hermann said. “They built a McDonald's
at Kingsway and Victoria, he had a hunch [it would hurt business]. So he sold it.”

Health issues such as diabetes would later affect Wally Stritzel, and he died back in 1996 at the age of 62.

Wally’s Burgers would continue to serve hundreds of customers until the signature Kingsway
location closed down in March 2008, after 46 years, to make way for condominiums. Connor Kim
was the owner of Wally's Burgers at the time, and he decided not to renew his lease but instead

sell the business. The decision was based on a combination of high rent and potential real
estate value for the property, as Kim told CBC Vancouver in a March 2008 interview.

“Many people have asked me, ‘Oh, why are you closing down?’ But, I’m sorry,
| don't have any power, just my apologies [to all my customers]. | have to leave. |
have a contract and they don’t want any more extended contracts.”

However, Wally's Burgers would not be gone for very long. The following year it would be
resurrected by Gordon Bemister. He had been working in radio in Vancouver and his position was
being eliminated around the same time the Wally’s Burgers Kingsway location was closing.

“| was a pretty regular customer and | understood how iconic it was, particularly to people
from East Vancouver,” Bemister said in an email interview with the Other Press. “A number of
fortunate events occurred, and to make a long story short, we were able to obtain the recipes,
the suppliers, and because of my radio employment ending, | had the initial capital to reopen in
the summer of 2009 at Cates Park in North Vancouver (open May to September yearly).”

     
 
  

  

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In February 2010, the new Wally's Burgers would open to a new generation of burger aficionados in
the Killarney Shopping Centre at 2661 East 49th Avenue. Bemister said his number one-
selling burger, and the one they are most famous for, is the Deluxe Chuck Wagon, featuring
two patties, onions, lettuce, tomato, and special sauce on the signature wagon bun.

  

    

Bemister said his restaurant appeals to both young and old people and
having that connection to the past is important for his business.

“| think Wally's Burgers represents a piece of history in Vancouver,” Bemister said. “Twenty years
ago, we used to go to Wally's as a family. It was an affordable burger place with an old school
retro feel and classic retro taste. Keeping it going was important to us because we are a tight-
knit family and we want to be able to give other families the same feeling it gave us. We focus