Dell Rhea's Chicken Basket - Willowbrook, IL
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Go Boilers!
N 41° 44.940 W 087° 55.980
16T E 422427 N 4622329
Opened in late 1930's or early 1940's in an old gas station lunch counter.
Waymark Code: WM9G3X
Location: Illinois, United States
Date Posted: 08/16/2010
Views: 4
The restaurant has been in the current location since 1946. Fried chicken is the main attraction. The meals are huge. You are going to have some leftovers.
?From their website: Dell Rhea's Chicken Basket got its humble beginnings sometime in the late 1930's or early 1940's in an old gas station lunch counter. One day two local farm women came in and overheard the owner (Irv Kolarik) talking about selling more food. Having a wonderful recipe for fried chicken they approached him and offered to teach him how to cook fried chicken if he would buy his chickens from them.
Because the fried chicken was so good and the highway so busy, the Chicken Basket outgrew its lunch counter and the 2 car repair bays were turned into a dining room. Not long after that, with the restaurant still growing, the adjacent land was purchased and a brand new restaurant was built.
The Chicken Basket as it is today opened in the summer of 1946 on Illinois Route 66 and 79th Street in Hinsdale right next door to its original location. Because of the amount of traffic and distance from Chicago the Chicken Basket was the perfect stopping place going to or coming from Chicago. This perfect location also lead to the Chicken Basket becoming a Blue Bird bus stop. People came to the Chicken Basket to purchase bus tickets to travel as far away as Los Angeles or to send packages to loved ones anywhere in between Chicago and LA.
The restaurant's many large windows allowed patrons to view the small private planes taking off and landing at the old Hinsdale airport across the street. There was always something going on at the Chicken Basket, whether the roof top ice skaters in the winter months or the live entertainment on the weekends.
The restaurant's need for chicken soon outgrew the capability of the 2 local women and another local farmer who was just moving into the area took over. That farmer was none other than Stanley Helma, father and grandfather of today's owners.
In the early 1960's, after Illinois Route 66 bypassed the Chicken Basket, it fell on hard times. People who remembered the restaurant couldn't figure out how to get to it and it almost went out of business for lack of customers. In 1963, Dell Rhea and his wife Grace bought the restaurant at a bargain price, Dell being very well known in the area used his reputation to help bring people back to the Chicken Basket.
Website: Not listed
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