Peek Through Time: People still crave hamburgers and potatoes "Orange" in Hamburg Ritzee

Peek Through Time: People still crave hamburgers and potatoes "Orange" in Hamburg Ritzee

Jackson, MI – Not many restaurateurs gave a farewell party, when they sell their restaurant, but more than 150 loyal customers came to say goodbye, when Melton and Leah Bradshaw walked away from 25 years ago in Hamburg Ritzee.

The party was organized by Mona Webb, a typist in the office of county treasurer, who said he visited the small restaurant at least twice a day, according to the Citizen Patriot file.

‘s just one example of how this city love Jackson “greasy spoon” that people who visited it in 33 years.

Very often called “The Ritzee,” Lloyd D. Jenkins opened the restaurant in 1954-128 W. Michigan Avenue. in the space previously occupied by The Shoppe mother.

E ‘was a great location for people who like to remember to eat there because it employs in the heart of what was then a center was. But even better, was near the Capitol Theatre.

“Two or three times a month to go, my father and I on the east side, near where was the old A & P store on Elm Street movie and then get to Hamburg and then to go home” said Jerry Kulpinski Township of Leoni.

Kulpinski, a former Goodyear Tire & Rubber Co. employee, and his wife, Judy, bought the Ritzee by Bradshaw in 1984. The Bradshaw began running in 1959 and bought the place eight years later, after the Citizen Patriot file.

The Bradshaw serves breakfast, lunch and dinner, but it was burgers and potatoes “Orange”, which claim to have been Ritzee to fame.

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Mulvaney would not reveal the secret to the orange potatoes but Kulpinski said it was a good amount of red pepper, along with some other spices to them their color.

“I kept the menu pretty much the same as Mel, but I’ve added things like homemade cake,” said Kulpinski. “I was also special offers such as golumbki.”

The restaurant was small and long, only 49 seats in the stands above. But there was a table by the window overlooking the Michigan Avenue area that many customers.

“I would take my two daughters every Saturday when they were 7 and 9, and it was still fun to hang with Dad Ritzee” said Greg Wilson, formerly of Jackson, and now Pho enix.

“We would try to get a table by the window, so the children could see the passers-by. We each get a hamburger and potatoes orange and sit back and enjoy our lunch. Then we went to the field ( LH) or Woolworth stores and go through this and then go jump on a bus and go home, “Wilson said.

It was not so relaxing for Nancy Pierce of Jackson Hicks. He was head usher at the Capitol Theatre for a while, then worked the candy counter and clean the “fat popcorn machine.” His lunch break, he always appeared next to “the best burgers in town.”

Trish O’Shea Jackson, who worked closely with First Federal Savings & Loan for 12 years, said he often took his hamburger and potatoes in an orange carrier “take out” and ate the Ritzee his desk, because there are so crowded at lunch time.

“I want to stop at Ritzee the morning for a slice of toast, or used to prepare the lunch there three out of five days, ” said O’Shea.

Jan Stevens of Jackson went on dates to her boyfriend Ritzee – who later became her husband. How many people went to Mass and then for a hamburger Ritzee.

Judy Bradley of Pleasant Lake, remembers his older brother, go to Ritzee “to find the girl.” She would walk the few blocks from the West Intermediate School to create a. Hamburgers and Cherry Coke

“It was the thing to do if you were in school,” agrees Trish Phillips of Lake Pleasant. “My two friends and I would go there at least once a week. The burgers were the best, thick and juicy, and always piled on lettuce and tomatoes. They were wonderful.”

Tidbits

Ritzee • Longtime owner Mel Bradshaw in the first hamburger in Battle Creek worked Kewpee hamburger. • Downtown Jackson

hopping during the heyday of Ritzee. There were more than half a dozen theaters and Bradshaw tells a story Citizen Patriot that all viewers of them came to Ritzee. “We are open almost 24 hours a day, seven days a week have been,” he said. While the theater and other stores in town closed, relaxed the burger business. Looked like

• Jerry Kulpinski, who bought the restaurant from Bradshaw in 1984, had to buy a restaurant in Indiana. But if the Ritzee went to the market, he bought and his wife Judy, proximity to home. They could hold only been open for three years for the pedestrian traffic so low. “We stayed open until 05 clock in the afternoon, but my car was often the only way,” said Kulpinski. He left the cafe buy Ritzee Grass Lake.

• The next man to testify was Ritzee Viaches Don, owner of the International Dog House, 800 Lansing Ave. He had successfully completed a push-cart selling hot dogs with spices in the middle of the city op erated. “I had the car a few hours or three days and did well, so I thought why not to operate from a fixed location,” said Viaches. He burned the Ritzee to make a second dog house. The lack of activity caused him to quit.