As they drove north on Homan, Lopata was reminiscing about Dave’s Red Hots, where he ate his first hot dogs as a boy. The shop was located on the southeast corner of Homan and Roosevelt, where the Plaza Court Townhouses now stand.
About three years ago Howard Lopata was driving around Lawndale with his son, Rob, and Peter Engler, the noted investigator of south-side culinary oddities such as the double cheeseburger known as the Big Baby and the tamale-chili combo dubbed the mother-in-law. The trio was exploring what old neighborhood guys like the elder Lopata call the “GVS,” or (with a Yiddish inflection) “The Great Vest Side,” looking specifically for old synagogues that had survived the riots and were reborn as Christian churches. Lopata Sr. is a retired radiologist who now lives in Northbrook. He hadn’t been back to the neighborhood where he grew up since 1952. When Lopata was a young kid, Lawndale was overwhelmingly populated by eastern European Jews, but his family was among the thousands who left during the decade of white flight in the 50s.
“I was reluctant to go in when I saw the barbed wire on the windows. I thought I was looking at a vacated place, you see?” But Engler went in and Lopata followed, and there they met Gina Fountain, whose father bought the stand from the original Dave and moved it across the street in the mid-70s. And there Lopata ordered his first dog and French fry combo in over 50 years. For $3.83, it was a sight more pricey than a nickel and dime, but still a pretty good deal.
Ketchup?
Correction: This story has been amended to reflect that Howard Lopata is a retired radiologist.
