The closure of Hathaway's Diner is the end of an era in Cincinnati

I don't know what to make of the sudden closure of Hathaway's Diner last week. Maybe the 65-year-old diner was past its prime. Or maybe the nostalgia factor had worn off. While many Cincinnatians have told me how much they loved the place, most said they hadn't been there in years, if not decades.

Some said the food wasn't as good or that the prices were too high (an issue facing most restaurants these days). A misguided few even said that they're afraid to go downtown, falsely believing it's some sort of crime-infested hellscape. (I work down here, not true.) Then there was the new location, which, to me at least, felt more like a candy-coated depiction of a 1950s diner than the musty old counter-service spot it was supposed to replicate. Still, I was glad it was there.

To me, this isn't just about the loss of a restaurant. It's about the loss of a downtown that hasn't existed for some time – a downtown where workers once crowded around Hathaway's horseshoe-shaped counters to shoot the breeze over goetta and eggs, or read the floppy broadsheet newspaper that the first waitress to arrive each morning was always in charge of buying. They remember a downtown that was once filled with small shops and department stores where mothers and daughters would fill enormous paper shopping bags at Closson's or Shillito's or Pogue's before staggering into Hathaway's for club sandwiches and milkshakes.

Those days are long gone. But with Hathaway's closing, the last physical reminder of them might be gone, too.

Our history: Downtown Cincinnati: What the past tells us

The communal counter

When Hathaway's opened inside the Carew Tower arcade in 1958, an Enquirer headline proclaimed it to be "one of the city's most elegant" restaurants, catering to the breakfast, lunch, tea and supper set. It had a staff of 35 waitresses, cooks and busboys, and could accommodate up to 100 people at a time.

It was a place where you might run into a star athlete or a famous singer in town to sing at the Beverly Hills Supper Club. Scrolling through The Enquirer archives, I found a story about the late June Trowbridge, who worked at Hathaway’s for 40 years and whose customers included Tommy Lasorda, Liberace, Jimmy Durante and Lena Horne, among others. “Honey,” she told The Enquirer in 1991, “I could write you a book.”

Hathaway's owner Lloyd H. Hathaway, a Massachusetts native and World War II veteran, was known by his friends as “Torchy” because of his red hair and fiery personality. He must have been a good boss, since many of his cooks and waitresses stuck around for decades, partly because he offered healthcare and other benefits.

The regular

Howard Wilkinson – who turned into a Hathaway’s regular almost as soon as he moved to Cincinnati in 1982 to take a job with The Enquirer – recalls the late Zonia "Zonie" Bryant, who worked behind the counter for decades. Though he was even more familiar with Geneva Huff, who served pancakes, eggs and coffee there for 42 years before retiring in 2022.

“They were the pillars of the place,” Wilkinson recalls.

Wilkinson, who now serves as the senior political analyst at WVXU, also recalls the prowess of kitchen manager Darryl Thomas, whom he refers to as the best short-order cook he has ever seen. ”If you got to know Darryl, he knew your order and he knew how you liked it," Wilkinson said.

When I asked Wilkinson about his favorite dishes, he went into an almost Bubba Gump-like trance as he recited them. There was the blue cheese burger with the thick slice of Bermuda onion, the spaghetti and meatballs, the meatloaf special on Thursdays ("that was the best friggin' meatloaf in town"). And, of course, the pancakes.

“They had the best pancakes I’ve ever eaten,” Wilkinson recalls. “Darryl would make the batter himself and they were miles above anything you would get at a place like Frisch’s or a national chain.”

But Wilkinson's favorite thing about Hathaway's was the sense of joy and camaraderie that could be found along those horseshoe-shaped counters. "That is where you got to know people and have conversations with people that maybe you did know and maybe you didn't know. Either way, you met a lot of interesting people: rich, poor and everything in between.”

Wilkinson recalls one customer in particular.

“There was an old lawyer who was about 100 years old. I mean it, 100 years old. He was a Republican who had worked for Bob Taft in the Senate office, and the author of the Taft-Hartley Act, which was anti-union. He looked like Woodrow Wilson with his three-piece suit, to a T. He would sit at Hathaway’s every day, this guy who was despised and hated by union people all over the city. But he would end up sitting next to them at the counter. I just loved watching the show. For me, the magic of Hathaway's was that counter because that is where people came together. This was a time not to argue politics. It was a time to relax and be with friends."

While Wilkinson couldn't recall the Woodrow Wilson doppelganger's name during our interview, I later figured out it was the late J. Mack Swigert.

Changing times

Over the years, as retail establishments in the arcade shut down and, later, as the promise of the adjacent Tower Place Mall gave way to bankruptcy, Hathaway’s started feeling more and more off the beaten path as the crowds appeared to thin, if not downright disappear.

The Carew Tower arcade was once a destination. Now, Wilkinson said, "you could fire off canons in there."

The lack of foot traffic was so significant that Hathaway's eventually started to feel cut off, if not completely alienated, from the rest of downtown. By 2021, current owner Danny Holbrook described the original location as a "tomb, with no windows, curb appeal or peek into the Cincinnati streets.”

Hope for Hathaway's future was reignited in August of 2021, when Holbrook negotiated a deal to relocate into a former Frisch's location across the arcade's lobby at 25 W. Fifth St.

It opened the following October, with enormous plate-glass windows looking out onto Fifth Street and Fountain Square − and a very different vibe. If the old Hathaway’s felt like a gritty "Mad Men"-era relic from the Carew Tower’s heyday, the new one – with its shiny retro '50s design and dozens of photos of the old spot on the wall – made it feel to some more like a memorial than a rebirth.

“There was a lot of interesting stuff on the wall, but it was almost too much,” Wilkinson said. “It distracted from the experience.”

But, according to Wilkinson, the real flaw of the new spot was the absence of what made the old one so special. You guessed it: the counters.

This isn't the first time

If you've lived in Cincinnati long enough, you know this isn't the first time Hathaway's has called it quits. No fewer than three obituaries have been written about the restaurant over the years.

In 1993, Lloyd Hathaway told The Enquirer he would shut down his restaurant when the Carew Tower’s then landlord, the Belvedere Corp., asked for $6,500 in back rent and took him to court over it.

“So Long, Old Friend,” read the headline of a 1995 Enquirer piece, after Lloyd Hathaway announced his retirement and the impending closure of his restaurant. At the time, he said the future of Hathaway's was doubtful given the dwindling downtown crowds and competition from the food court at Tower Place Mall. Soon after, the Knoxville, Tennessee-based Manna Group purchased the restaurant, keeping the name and most of Mr. Hathaway’s employees.

Then, in January of 2019, former Enquirer food critic Polly Campbell penned another obit for Hathaway's after Holbrook was unable to reach a lease agreement with Carew Tower to make improvements to the old location or relocate Hathaway’s to a new spot with a street view. The following June, Campbell followed up with another story headlined "Hathaway’s: You know it’s still open, right?"

Is this really it?

According to Holcomb, a big part of the reason for Hathaway's latest closure announcement was the lack of workers downtown now that so many people are working from home. In a Facebook post announcing the closure, he also blamed competition from the food trucks at Fountain Square over the summer and lobbed several attacks at the city of Cincinnati and the Cincinnati Center City Development Corp. (3CDC). Both released statements disputing those claims.

In the end, it was the state of Ohio that shut Hathaway's down, taking away its vendor's license due to $17,000 in back taxes, something Holbrook finds suspicious since he said he had negotiated an agreement with the state to pay them in December.

On Monday, Holcomb took to Facebook again. This time, he just wanted to thank the customers who stuck with him over the years and continued to believe in what he was doing.

"I knew Hathaway's had a large following," he wrote. "I really have to say I always loved working downtown and serving everyone. I made so many true friends. I realized by being shut down just how much people really (care). It restored my faith in the majority of people. You all have Hathaway's in common and Hathaway's has each one of you in common."

Right now, Holcomb is working to liquidate his restaurant. So, unless the Hathaway's space is rented out by someone who wants to continue its legacy and keep the name, this is probably it. But hey, never say never.

No matter what the reasons for Hathaway's closure were, I can tell you this: If there's a restaurant you love but haven't visited in a while, now might be the time to do just that.

This article originally appeared on Cincinnati Enquirer: The end of Hathaway's Diner is the end of an era in Cincinnati