


In 1947, Alex Schoenbaum opened the Parkette Drive-In next to his father’s bowling alley in Charleston, West Virginia. After meeting with Big Boy founder Bob Wian in 1951, Schoenbaum became a Big Boy franchisee on February 7, 1952, now calling his several locations the Parkette Big Boy Shoppes. In May 1954, a public "Name the Parkette Big Boy Contest" was announced, and in June 1954 Schoenbaum's five Parkette Drive-Ins were rebranded as Shoney's.

Shoney's (the Parkette) was originally the Big Boy franchisee for West Virginia; however, Schoenbaum rapidly grew the chain through subfranchising, expanding his Big Boy territory through the southeastern United States, excluding Florida only because the rights already belonged to fellow Big Boy franchisee Frisch's.

Schoenbaum's earliest subfranchisees operated under their own names. In 1955, Leonard Goldstein became a subfranchisee in Roanoke, Virginia. Originally operating as Shoney's, he eventually changed to Lendy's Big Boy after another Shoney's subfranchisee called Yoda's Big Boy opened across town. In 1956 a subfranchise was sold to the Boury brothers in northern West Virginia, who operated as Elby's. Elby's, Lendy's, and Yoda's units were originally listed with Shoney's units on the back of the Shoney's menu. Also in 1956, Schoenbaum sold a subfranchise to Abe Becker in Rochester, New York, for Becker's Big Boy. Two Philadelphia area subfranchises, Tunes and Arnold's, were opened during this period as well. In 1959 Shap's Big Boy was subfranchised in Chattanooga, Tennessee, later assuming the Shoney's name. After this, all subfranchises went by the name Shoney's.

Doubling in size every four years, Shoney's became the largest Big Boy franchisee, operating over one third of the Big Boy restaurants nationwide. As Shoney's dominated Big Boy, a 1959 franchisee named Raymond Danner would dominate Shoney's, acquiring the company in 1971 (WIKIPEDIA).

The great thing about Shoney's is that it's close to my work, and they have a buffet. So, it's an easy lunch trip. I met my friend Dawn and we happened to be visiting on a "comfort food" buffet day.




Now that I've conquered all of the DiCarlo's within West Virginia, I'm starting to branch out into Pennsylvania and Ohio.








Dwight's is a well-known restaurant in St. Albans.


This restaurant was opened in 1993. In the 50's our family restaurants were named Adkins Fat Boy's, after Mike's Grandfather Benny Adkins. The first Dwights was opened in 1963 by Mike's Father, Dwight Messinger. Our family started in the restaurant business in 1950 as a simple drive up restaurant. Mike is now the third generation from a family who has mostly owned mom and pop restaurants.
Over the years we have owned many, many restaurants, but today there is only one Dwights Restaurant left in operation.
Our restaurant is small with only sixteen tables, but our goal remains to offer our customers a great meal at a reasonable price. That does not mean, however, that we compromise quality to do so. On the contrary: We guarantee the freshness of our ingredients, and prepare everything just the way you like it. We are a family restaurant with a tradition in food excellence.
We are dedicated to preserving a fantastic dining tradition. Our homemade sandwiches and burgers are, to us, a piece of home that we would like to preserve for the next generation. (ABOUT)

Sara entertained my request to try this restaurant, and we headed out after work one day.







And I may have taken a piece of "graham cracker pie" for the road, which was graham cracker and vanilla custard. Yum.

Driving through Chapmanville, I stumbled upon Dairy Delight.




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