Harry Heftman, who turned 100 years old last month, is about to close his Chicago restaurant, Harry’s Hot Dogs, a little diner at the corner of Randolph and Franklin streets in The Loop that has become an institution after 55 years of business.
The diner helped Heftman and his late wife put three children through school, employ dozens of workers through the years and feed hundreds of customers untold amounts of Vienna hot dogs.
Heftman doesn’t have any retirement plans, and chances are he would have kept Harry’s Hot Dogs going if the city wasn’t bulldozing the building out from under him.
Heftman was 12 years old when his family immigrated to Chicago from Hungary. He used to work after school for local grocery stores. In the 1930s, he and his brother set up a fruit stand and later opened a series of restaurants. Harry’s Hot Dogs started out as the Little Snack Shop on the ground floor of the Showman’s League building. The Showman’s League was a professional organization for circus workers. Elephants are carved above the upper level’s windows. The city is undertaking a $7 million project to clear the corner where the Harry’s Hot Dog sits and create a park for two new office buildings. Harry’s will serve its last hot dogs on Friday, April 10.
How have you managed to keep your restaurant running for so many years?
You have to have a wonderful location and take care of customers and treat them right. Talk to them. Ask them how they are. Find out everything about them. People are happy to come to a place were people will talk to them.
FAST FACTS BIRTHPLACE: Sojmy, HungaryBIRTH DATE: March 15, 1909EXPERIENCE: ran a fruit store in the late 1930s, and then a succession of restaurants in the 1940s and 1950s; opened the Little Snack Shop diner at the corner of Randolph and Franklin in 1954, which, after a remodel in 1982, was renamed Harry’s Hot DogsPERSONAL: widowed; three children; four grandchildren; one great-grandchild
What about your employees?
I had people who stayed with me for 10, 15 years. A lot have retired. The new generation is kind of tough, but they are OK. All my employees know I’m selling the business, and I will take care of them before I leave.
What advice would you give restaurant operators today?
You have to have a very, very good location, and you have to know what to do. And you have to have a good cook. It’s very tough to run a restaurant.
What are you going to do after the restaurant closes?
That’s a big, big problem for me. What am I going to do? I’m a handy man. I can fix things, but it’s not easy. I was there [at the restaurant] every day. I never missed a day, although now I’m there four days a week. I like to meet people, say good morning to them. Maybe I would make a good host.
