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December 12

A restaurant worthy of note

In the 1950's, my parents took me (too often) to a restaurant that was something of an institution. The name of the restaurant was "The Barn", and to say it was opulent was an understatement. It was located just south of Chicago in either Burbank IL, or Oak Lawn. It was quite large, and usually busy. You could not park your car, you had to let a valet do that for you. They offered food items which few, if any, other restaurants of this era in Chicago did. They went out of their way to appear elegant and upper class. They had an unlisted phone number, yet you needed to have a reservation, so you had to get their phone number from an existing customer. There was no sign on the building, or at thee driveway, indicating what it was. I would be interested in what happened to the restaurant, when it was founded, etc. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 173.228.88.78 (talk) 01:50, 12 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]

I don't know if this is relevant, but on this page about top restaurants in the Chicago suburbs includes a "The Barn", but it's on the other side of Chicago, in Evanston. --174.95.161.129 (talk) 02:06, 12 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]

I found this article about the closing of The Old Barn Restaurant. It reads like it might be the one your remembering so I hope this helps. MarnetteD|Talk 02:13, 12 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]

A 2015 update: Burbank hopes for new life in The Old Barn which says it "dates to 1921 and originally was a speakeasy during Prohibition... famous people such as W.C. Fields, Al Capone and Charles Lindbergh were said to have frequented The Old Barn".

And a rather sad corollary to that from 2017: Wrecking ball hits Burbank's Old Barn Restaurant.

I also found a 1955 menu from The Old Barn Restaurant once located at 8100 S Parkside Ave Burbank, IL.

Alansplodge (talk) 12:07, 12 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]