A Place Where Everyone Knows You

 

My husband and I have a favorite neighborhood restaurant we like to visit.  It’s the kind of warm, homey place where everyone knows everyone else.  If they don’t know you, they know your neighbor, or your cousin, or your brother, or your first grade teacher. Start talking to the people in the next booth and there always seems to be a connection, sometimes it even goes back to the “old neighborhoods” or even the “old country.”  Somehow there is always a connection.

We go there so frequently; our kids like to joke that we have booth # 1 at Fox’s Beverly Pub.  Fox’s is a modest little restaurant on the Southside of Chicago that that is known for (despite billing itself as an “Irish American” Restaurant) its pizza.   The inside is a welcoming blend of exposed brink, well worn old wooden booths and dim lights.  Most of the wait staff has been there for years, most are related to one another and come from the neighborhood.    A small bar at one end is home to a small group of regulars. But in fact, the whole place is usually full of regulars.   Which is why we, like so many others, enjoy going there.

Local lore has it that Fox’s started out as a speakeasy during prohibition.   I’ve never been able to confirm that – but what I can confirm is that it was orginally owned by Al Compone’s sister …. reportedly as a deli.

Sometime in the 50’s or 60’s, Tom and Therese Fox’s owned a pizza place originally located on west 99^th street close to the Rock Island railway station.   Tom, who grew up at 71^st and May, was an apprentice electrician when he and his wife moved to the Beverly neighborhood in 1962.  In 1963 they brought and took over small carry-out pizza business at 9908 Walden Parkway.

At the same time, Al Capone’s youngest sister, Mafalda Capone Maritote, owned and operated the deli at 9956 South Western. In a story published in the Chicago Tribune on November 6, 1994 and written by Scott Broden, Tom Fox related that he and his wife knew Capone’s sister and would sometimes swap take out orders with her.

“On Sunday nights she’d call us up for a couple of pizzas, and she’d send us a dozen corned beef sandwiches,’ he said. Pizza and sandwiches had been traded for a couple of years when, in 1965, Fox got a phone call from Maritote.  ‘She said she wanted out and asked us to take over,’ Fox explained. ‘I said I couldn’t handle that much business, and she said, `Don’t worry, I’ll make you an offer you can’t refuse.’[1]

Eventually Tom and Therese transformed the deli into a little restaurant and carry-out pizza place and renamed it Fox’s Beverly Pub.   They’ve subsequently opened several more restaurants, but to the people of Beverly there is only one Fox’s and it sits on the northwest corner of 100^th and Western.

People who have raised their families and moved out of the area still return often for the pizza and, I believe, to see who they will run into.  Emily and Chris relocated downtown several years ago but are frequent visitors as are Holly and Bob who moved to the suburbs but can be seen eating there almost as often as the locals.  Some of the more loyal regulars even have gotten their name on Fox’s marquee when they died.  “We will miss you, Roger!” was one sad farewell posted.

Memories of times spent there often go back years.  I remember going to Fox’s during the blizzard in 1979.  The streets were impassable with the 29 inches of snow that had accumulated.  After hours of shoveling, we, along with a group of neighbors, tossed aside the snow removal equipment, hired babysitters for our then-still-little-ones, and trudged six blocks through deep snowdrifts to the warmth of the old wooden booths, hot pizza and cold beer offered by Fox’s.  There we met and partied with others from the neighborhood also seeking respite from the realities of Chicago’s bitter winter.

And then there are the characters that have frequented Fox’s over the years.  There was old Mr. Kelly who once worked for the CTA and whose lovely wife  was deceased.  He lived alone above a storefront insurance office several doors south of Fox’s.  Mr. Kelly, with head full of unruly snow-white hair, would eat there every night, sit and the same corner booth by the kitchen and order a cup of soup, a plain cheeseburger and a cup of coffee.  Mr. Kelly would stare down at the table while he ate but otherwise loved to talk to the wait staff.  He not only knew all of their names but their birthdays and other special occasions in the lives.  Mr. Kelly liked to go to the all-night adoration at St. Bernadette’s church (located several miles away) on Friday nights but didn’t drive.  So the waitresses would take turns dropping him there on their way home and he’d catch a ride back in the morning. All the workers at Fox’s made sure he was well cared for and, as he grew weaker with age, got home safely.

Other interesting patrons include re a married couple who can be seen at the bar almost any night of the week.  He’s a meek-looking man probably in his 60’s, just under 6’ and maybe 190 pounds.  He’s a bartender at the  Hilton hotel on Michigan Avenue.  His wife, on the other hand, is well over 6’  – – – maybe 6’6” – – – and built like a linebacker for the Chicago Bears with hands as large as Michael Jordan’s. She’s a psychologist who counts at least one of the waitresses amoung her clients.  Who rules in this relationship?  It’s the meek-looking bartender who seems to always insist on speaking for both of them.

Fox’s decorates for all the holidays but St. Patrick’s Day is the best.  And parade day would’t be complete without a stop at Fox’s for some corned beef and cabbage, a cold beer and a lot of traditional Irish music, Irish step-dancing by local school children and the Shannon Rovers playing the bagpipes.

 

 

My husband and I love running into neighborhood friends at Fox’s.  People we wouldn’t otherwise see anymore.  One is Maureen C, a retired CPS principal and a former Mercy nun who was in the convent with my sister and who carpooled with me when our boys were in preschool; our boys remain close friends.  She also is one of the funniest  – –  and nicest  – – people I know.

Now, in addition to consulting, Maureen teaches an adult education class on Irish History at the local college; because of her tremendous personality as well as her depth of knowledge, there always is waiting list to get into her class.  Maureen is at Fox’s most Monday nights with a friend and most Thursdays nights with her sister and niece.

Jack O, father of 13 who is now in a wheelchair, either hangs at the bar or, if with his wife, in one of the booths.  Jack came from the same old neighborhood as I did, St. Justin Martyr in West Englewood. My brother tells the story of how Jack’s older sister won a talent contest on the Morris B. Sacks radio program back in the ‘40’s.  His sister won with the help of the nuns at St. Justin’s.  They had every kid in the school fill out and mail in a post card voting for her.  It was probably the only time in history that a tap dancer won a talent contest on the radio.

One night in in particular stands out in my mind.  When my husband and I were courting we would often find ourselves at Fox’s late at night.  One cold, snowy January night we turned the paper placemat over and planned out our wedding.

The stories of Fox’s are endless  . . . . and maybe someday I will add to this brief ramblings about it.  But now, well, its Saturday night and we’re off to Fox’s!

 

[1] Chicago Tribune, 11/6/1995, Scott Broden