White Castle steps in with an offer to help save a castle-shaped Kansas diner
There has been a flood of social media reaction to news that a castle-shaped portable diner is on the market for free if someone is willing to move it.
One commenter said: “I think the White Castle corporation needs to swoop in and save this building!”
Now, that’s what the Ohio-based company is offering — sort of.
“As the ones to start it all 102 years ago, our family business would like to do our part to preserve this history and source of good memories,” said a White Castle release quoting vice president Jamie Richardson, a fourth-generation member of the family who founded the chain in Wichita in 1921.
The company, which moved to Columbus, Ohio, in 1934 and bills itself as “America’s first fast-food hamburger chain,” wants to help move the building if there are historical societies or museums interested in having it.
The news release said those groups can contact the chain’s “home office at its historic preservation hotline at 614-559-2687.”
This is even though the building isn’t a former White Castle.
“Given its aesthetic similarities to original White Castle restaurants and its location near Wichita . . . it’s understandable why people would think it could have been part of the pioneer fast-food chain,” the release said.
“Nevertheless,” Richardson said, “we have great reverence for all that the fast-food industry has done to serve up hot, tasty and affordable food across generations, and this building is a part of that important history.”
The chain even is offering to help get the building to a competitor’s “headquarters as a tribute to our shared humble beginnings and the positive impact we’ve had on our team members and the communities we serve.”
The building is 20 by 20 feet wide, 15 feet tall and features a lunch counter with stools. It most likely was built by Wichita’s Ablah Hotel Supply, which built prefabricated diners in the late 1920s and well into the 1930s.
One of Ablah’s salesmen was Arthur Valentine, and when the company stopped producing the diners, it allowed Valentine to take over. Most of the diners of that style that still exist today are known as Valentine Diners and include the now-closed Brint’s Diner at 4834 E. Lincoln, Grinder Man at 510 E. Pawnee and Sport Burger at 134 N. Hillside.
The castle-like diner most likely originally came from around the corner where Sport Burger is now.
It probably was either the former Little Palace Lunch No. 1 at 3037 E. Douglas or the Continental Grill No. 2 at 3012 E. Douglas. Both addresses are just east of Douglas and Hillside.
The owners of the Douglass diner tried unsuccessfully once before to get the diner moved.
They had agreed to donate the building to the Historic Preservation Alliance of Wichita and Sedgwick County, but alliance president Greg Kite said he had trouble finding a company to move the building.
“We continue to have tremendous interest in it,” he said.
“It’s a wonderful piece of Wichita’s history.”
