MONTGOMERY, Ala. (AP) - In the 100 years since Chris Katechis opened his shop on Dexter Avenue, Chris’ Hot Dogs has watched history pass by its green and glass storefront.
Horses and buggies gave way to cars.
At the Capitol down the street, Gov. George Wallace declared “segregation forever.”
Two years later, civil rights foot soldiers would march past Chris’ and prove him wrong.
Chris’ has survived two world wars and two economic collapses.
It’s fed Hank Williams, Elvis Presley, the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr., four U.S. presidents and every Alabama governor since it opened on May 1, 1917.
It’s also served the homeless, the penniless and generations of families looking for any reason to be handed a hot dog. All the way, please.
Beneath its signature green awning, Chris’ has not just been a witness to history. It’s been a part of it.
Until last year, the largest order of hot dogs ever placed at Chris’ was 2,000 for a Wallace campaign rally. It was also one of the few restaurants to serve both blacks and whites during the segregation era. Wallace would pick up a cigar from Chris’ on the way to the hill. King would pick up the out-of-town newspapers on his way to church. During the world wars, Chris sold war bonds and encouraged customers to dump scrap metal in front of the store for donation. The day the war ended was the restaurant’s busiest day.
A lot has changed in 100 years. Somehow - and thankfully - Chris’ hasn’t.
“People get mad when we put up new paint,” joked Gus Katechis, the third-generation owner of Chris’, who runs the restaurant with his dad Theo. “I always say that if these walls could talk, they’d have some stories to tell.”
A Greek immigrant. A hot dog joint. A secret sauce and a commitment to treating customers like family. Who knew the American dream could be found on a flattop?
Originally opened as the Post Office Cafe, Chris’ was a newspaper and fruit stand that also served hot dogs. The famous sauce had not yet been concocted, and in the early Prohibition years, “secret sauce” just referred to the whiskey hidden under the fruit. Chris, who came to Montgomery from Greece by way of Ellis Island, taught himself English by reading the Montgomery Journal, and it wasn’t until the early 1920s that Chris perfected the signature sauce.
“You had to have something different to stand out,” Gus said. “It took my grandfather a few years to get the sauce right. People come in and say, ’I don’t eat a hot dog anywhere but here.’ It’s got a little heat but not too much.”
Walk into Chris’ on any given day, and you’ll find yourself staring down the barrel of a shotgun-style establishment. Past the coolers of beer, glass-bottled Coca-Colas, chocolate milk and vintage wall decor, you’ll inevitably find Gus or Theo behind the counter, one reason Gus thinks his family’s business has lasted three generations.
Through the decades Chris’ somehow became an ambassador for Montgomery, a person everybody in town wants newcomers to meet. When Franklin Delano Roosevelt rode the train through town, a porter would run from Union Station to Dexter Avenue to fetch some wieners. When Elvis Presley played Garrett Coliseum, he ordered 200 hot dogs for his crew and ate six of them himself. Anybody who comes to town will most likely be told to visit the diner, just as first-time customers Fazia Mack and Tim Gaughran were when they visited Montgomery a week before Chris’ 100th anniversary.
“The hamburgers are phenomenal, and the sauce is something totally different. It was a great experience,” said Mack who, along with her husband, had been teaching in Turkey for the past three years.
When looking at why Chris’ has had so much success for the past 100 years, the secret may not be the sauce at all.
Chris had one secret he was willing to share, it was how he made everybody he met a part of the family.
Chris’ has a history of donating to and feeding local organizations, and Chris was famous for giving out silver dollars to customer’s children, a gesture that Theo said ensured the next generation would grow up as part of the family as well.
Perhaps the ultimate story of customer loyalty was that of the unnamed breadrunner who was buried with two Chris’ hot dogs in 2012.
“He used to sell bread to this place, he met his wife here, he took his kids here so it was a big part of his life,” Theo said. “The preacher came by and said he wanted to be buried with two hot dogs. I said, ’I’m going to give him two hot dogs, but I’m not going to deliver his hot dogs to wherever he’s going.”
Once an understated hot dog stand, Chris’ Hot Dogs has become a great equalizer, a hall of power where lawmakers discussing infrastructure dollars can rub elbows with the men building the road. If King, Wallace, Elvis and Hank were alive today, they, too would have the same stories to tell as the firefighters and Air Force officers who spend their lunch sitting in the booths in the back.
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Information from: Montgomery Advertiser, https://www.montgomeryadvertiser.com
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