Rock Café | |
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| Location | 114 W. Main Street Stroud, Oklahoma |
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| Coordinates | 35°44′56″N96°39′16″W / 35.749°N 96.6544°W /35.749; -96.6544 |
| Built | 1938 |
| Built by | Roy Rieves |
| Architectural style | Bungalow/Craftsman |
| MPS | Route 66 in Oklahoma MPS |
| NRHP reference No. | 01000661[1] |
| Added to NRHP | June 14, 2001 |
TheRock Café inStroud, Oklahoma, a historic restaurant onU.S. Route 66, takes its name from the local sandstone used in its construction.[2]
Originally built in 1936 and opened in 1939, the Rock Café reopened on May 29, 2009[3] after extensive repairs by historic preservationist David Burke[4] due to damage from a 2008 fire.[5] The restaurant's cookbook,[6] written during the rebuilding effort,[7] was published in November 2009.
Rock Café proprietor Dawn Welch, a long-time promoter ofU.S. Route 66 in Oklahoma[8] selected byThe Oklahoman as Oklahoma's 2009 Woman of the Year,[9] is the basis foranimated character Sally Carrera in thePixar filmCars.[10]
Roy Rieves started building the Rock Café in 1936 during theDust Bowl era of theGreat Depression and relied on local materials to build the café's distinctive stone exterior, doing much of the construction work himself or hiring students. The original costs included $100 for the land and $5 for localKellyville sandstone[11] left over from construction on theU.S. Route 66 roadway which had come toStroud, Oklahoma in 1926.[12]
The café opened in August 1939, initially operating under manager Miss Thelma Holloway,[13] and was a busy localGreyhound bus stop duringWorld War II.[2] Itsneon signage was installed in the late 1940s. Mamie Mayfield operated the Rock Café twenty-four hours a day in 1959 and retired at age 70 on July 14, 1983.[14]
Business from cross-country truckers declined with the construction ofInterstate 44 in Oklahoma, atoll road, although Highway 66 remains as a free alternative to theTurner Turnpike. AfterU.S. Route 66 wasdecommissioned in 1985, highway 66 becameOklahoma State Highway 66. Dawn Welch, the current proprietor, acquired the café from Ed Smalley in 1993.[15]
Mamie J. Mayfield's (December 22, 1912 - September 25, 1994) name was kept alive in the form of asouvenir shop, Mamie's General Store.
In 1999, anF3 tornado heavily damaged Stroud, destroying the town's 53-store Tanger Outlet mall and wiping out a handful of key local employers including a Sygma food service distribution facility.[16] The Rock Café survived, though its neon sign was damaged, but business was down by half due to the state of the fragile local economy. In 2001, the Rock Café was listed on theNational Register of Historic Places, qualifying it for matching grants and loans to finance its historic restoration.
When the firstPixar crews researching Route 66 stopped at the Rock Café in 2001, restoration and repair of the 1999 tornado damage was not yet complete; the neon flickered briefly but failed to come to life. With a federal grant and a loan of $30,000 in matching funds, the Rock Café was restored with new heating and air conditioning systems, replacement of the original wiring, restoration of neon signage and a return of the building to its original layout.[17]
In 2007, travelling artistBob Waldmire depicted the café in one of his works;[18]Food Network'sDiners, Drive-Ins and Dives also devoted part of an episode to the Rock. On January 21, 2010, Dawn Welch appeared onNBC-TV´sToday show, cooking and promoting her book. The January 2010 edition of "Oklahoma Living" magazine named the Rock Café "Best Oklahoma Diner", featuring its proprietor in a cover photo.[19]
Stroud, Oklahoma also slowly began to recover economically through increased activity in theoil and gas sectors and intourism. While the destroyed outlet shopping mall was not rebuilt, the community successfully marketed its industrial park, and is now a leading small city in oilfield manufacturing and transportation, particularly in the rail and pipeline sectors.
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| Davenport |
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| Meeker |
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| Midlothian |
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| Prague |
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| Stroud |
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| Warwick |
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| Wellston |
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