August 30, 2001

Plains Folk: Small Town Drive-ins Still Live

Tom Isern, Professor of History
North Dakota State University

In a past column I confessed my weakness for family-owned drive-in restaurants with hand-lettered signs in the windows. Consequently I've been hearing from northern plains folk about drive-ins to check out.

Ambience counts for a lot with these places. Along with hand-lettered signs, a bright paint job helps. I like a gravel drive, because car tires on gravel give a homely sound to an establishment. It's good if there's a place to sit in the shade and watch people go by. 

Mr. Bob's Drive Inn in Selby, S.D., is like that. It sits on the east side of Highway 83, on the south edge of town, across the road north from Tollefson's used farm equipment. Laurena Idler is manager of the place, has been for 31 years, although it's named for her husband. Bob, now retired from other employment, also pulls duty in the establishment now, but confesses, "It should be called Mrs. Bob's."

Pausing en route to Pierre, I park on the south side under Mr. Bob's canopy, because that's the side with the hand-lettered signs promising the stoke-your-boiler grilled-and-fried specialties that keep a traveler lubricated, and the soft ice cream that cools his engine. I'm feeling healthy today, put some slaw in the bag with the other stuff.

Over in Hankinson, N.D., I pull into the Dakota Drive-In, where the bright green canopy and posts are so inviting, and the hamburgers are hand-formed. Like many such establishments seeking to distinguish themselves from the big chains, the Dakota has signature sundaes; I select the S'more Parfait, take a picture of it, devour it, and give the last melting bite to my retriever, who by this time has attracted a crowd of neighborhood kids.

The owner here is Brandon Wahler, and the manager is his mother, Eileen. The Wahlers get pretty busy in summer, because they have a farm as well as the drive-in.

Up the road to Lidgerwood, where the Starlite Drive-In awaits. If a building can smile, this place is smiling. It's red-white-and-blue, with candy-stripe posts supporting the canopy, yellow flourescent tubes underneath, red-and-white curtains in the windows. The sign in the window says the proprietors are "The Fast Food Pro's."

More specifically, they are Jane and Reuben Medenwald and their three kids. I met Brad at the cash register. He claims to be the restaurant's top salesman, bringing in the high-school-girl trade. I didn't have the opportunity to ask his sisters' opinions.

The Starlite does a great summer custom in foods hot and cold with diners young and old. The food is good, consistent fare, and you're dining with family.

Marlene Larson, self-described chief cook and bottle washer of Larson's Drive Inn, Larimore, said to stop by, and so looping around from a business call in Grand Forks, I did. There were girls hopping cars in the lot and waiting tables inside at the same time, all of them wearing these fetching Larson's T-shirts (I got one) in four colors.

Good signs here, too. There's a Game Night Special of burgers and family-size fries on Polar Bear game nights. School kids are advised to call in their lunch orders so they will be ready to pick within the lunch period. In the kitchen, makers of malts and shakes are ordered to eat their mistakes. (Seems to me that might encourage mistakes.)

Marlene (at the grill this night) and Art have run a drive-in in Larimore for 21 years. This year they have a new building, or rather a new old building, moved over from Grand Forks. The place is jumping on Sunday evening. Chicken and shrimp are going fast. Malts go down slow, because they're thick.

I drive home plowing through beets, potatoes, beans, wheat harvest in progress. Dusk, chaff in the air, long shadows across a rich country.

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Source: Tom Isern, (701) 799-2941, tom@plainsfolk.com 
Editor: Gary Moran, (701) 231-7865, gmoran@ndsuext.nodak.edu 

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