It’s always sad to see a good company pass into history. Howard Johnson’s is one of those companies. Most people, I’d dare say, probably would associate the name “Howard Johnson’s” with a hotel before associating it with a restaurant. But before the hotels came the restaurant, which all started with ice cream in the 1920s, and from there onto a full line of foods and twenty-eight different flavors of ice cream. At its peak, Howard Johnson’s Restaurant was the world’s largest restaurant chain, with more than 1,000 locations along roadsides and at turnpike service plazas. Nowadays, only ten locations remain. Nine are vintage, all in the eastern United States from Maryland to Maine. Then there is one new location in Puerto Rico. The location seen at left is the Afton Mountain location on US 250 between Waynesboro and Charlottesville. This location closed in 1998. It seems, though, that Howard Johnson’s decline came from competition by other restaurants, as well as a few ownership changes, most significantly with the acquisition of Howard Johnson’s by Marriott. Marriott separated the restaurant business from the hotel business, selling the hotels off to another company. However, it seemed that instead of wanting to preserve Howard Johnson’s, Marriott had their own plans for the locations, planning to turn them into other things. After a lawsuit by the franchisees, Howard Johnson’s Restaurant is now owned by a company called Franchise Associates. And now, sad to say, Howard Johnson’s Restaurants are becoming fewer and further between all the time, as Afton closed in 1998, Harrisonburg closed in 2001, and most recently, the Wilmington, Delaware location became a “Hollywood Grill” location. Sad to see it go…
Date posted: October 12, 2003