In 1886, Grover Cleveland was president, the Statue of Liberty was
About two months from now, Reeves Restaurant, Washington's oldest,
will close, a casualty of downtown development. Its owners say it may
reopen in the office building that will replace it, but its 50 employees
and hundreds of loyal patrons are preparing themselves for a last
farewell.
In a city not known for its character-filled neighborhood bars or
colorful ethnic sections, many people think the passing of this bit of
old Washingtonia is a cause for mourning. It's the kind of place where a
longtime breakfast diner sits at the same table every day and doesn't
have to place an order to get what he wants.
"The customers are saying to us, 'I just can't believe you're
closing,' " said Mary Marshall, a Reeves waitress for 20 years whose
mother has worked there 46 years and whose grandmother worked there,
too.
"I'm very definitely upset by their closing," said Harriet
McWilliams, a Smithsonian Institution employee who has been ordering the
cream cheese and olive sandwiches there since her mother brought her as
a child. "It's going to be sad losing it."
"We're proud we've gotten the working-class people, the native
Washingtonians to come," said Hank Abraham, who owns the business with
his brother George.
The Abrahams come from the warm-hearted school of restauranting. They
spring from their booth near the entrance to greet a longtime patron by
name, with a caress to the forearm or shoulder blade, before leading the
customer to a favorite seat.
The closing of Reeves Restaurant & Bakery represents a change of life
for old F Street, once one of downtown's major retailing centers. But
the longtime merchants of that area of old downtown hit hard times,
especially after the 1968 riots. Now the neighborhood is undergoing a
remarkable rebound. Many of F Street's best-known retailers have been
driven out or sold out to developers, including the Esther Shops, Rich's
Shoes, Hahns Shoes and G.C. Murphy. Gleaming glass-sheathed office
buildings are replacing the old turn-of-the-century storefronts where
families window-shopped for generations.
Now Reeves, known as much for its baked goods -- such as its
world-famous strawberry pie -- as for its restaurant trade, sits
precariously next to a colossal construction pit that will yield an
office building next year.
The Reeves building and the adjoining parking lot will make way for
yet another office building, at 12th and F, on which construction has
not started. And the building's lower floors will house a Lord & Taylor
department store, if the D.C. government can entice that company here.
Oliver Carr Co. announced this week that it is joining Buvermo
Properties Inc., a group of Dutch investors, to develop the 12th and F
site. Business people say Carr's track record -- including development
of the Hecht's store nearby -- could be a boost in the long-shot
negotiations to lure the retailer.
With such big-bucks players involved, the Reeves story would seem to
be another big-business-drives-away-the-little-guy saga so common in
D.C. real estate. But that's not the whole story.
The fact is the Abraham brothers, who bought the business in 1965
from the Reeves family, will have options to reopen. They simply may not
want to.
Two years ago, they sold their 1209 F St. property -- including the
Reeves name and the upstairs bakery -- to Buvermo for $7 million.
Downtown developers, who want to avoid the sterility of office
complexes by reproducing Reeves' homey feel, have competed to draw the
Abrahams to a new site.
George Abraham said Buvermo has offered him financial incentives that
are "hard to turn down" to stay in the planned 12th and F complex.
Robert O. Carr, the Carr company's president, said Carr is "very
interested" in helping Reeves relocate downtown, but he thinks it would
be best for Reeves to relocate soon rather than waiting two or three
years for the planned 12th and F complex to open. George Abraham is
vague about his family's plans, except to say that reopening the
business is "a possibility."
Family friends said George, 62, an undercover narcotics agent busting
heroin dealers in Lebanon, Syria and Chicago in the 1950s before he went
into the restaurant business, would prefer to retire.
The brothers already know the difficulties of starting over from the
year they spent rebuilding the restaurant after a February 1984 fire.
The Abrahams are workaholics who rarely take vacations. George has
the coffee brewed when the waitresses arrive at 5:30 a.m. He said his
doctor has warned him he may not take easily to retirement.
George's daughter Sheryl, who manages the place, said Reeves may
reopen some day under new management.
But Jeffrey Axelrad, a longtime Reeves customer who is director of
the Justice Department's torts branch, is skeptical. "A Reeves owned by
other than the Abrahams wouldn't be the same," he said.
Reeves has been an intimate part of downtown's street life for as
long as anyone can remember.
Waitresses recall the FBI G-man whom J. Edgar Hoover sent over to
pick up his ham sandwiches. They remember Pat Nixon sitting at the
half-block-long wooden counter when husband Richard was vice president,
as did First Ladies Bess Truman and Lady Bird Johnson.
By the mid-1960s, the Reeves family was having trouble keeping the
place going. Most of its patrons were women, and the tea room menu was
mostly finger sandwiches and sweets.
When the Abrahams took over 23 years ago, they changed the tea room
atmosphere and brought in a new clientele, from construction workers to
FBI agents, by introducing heartier fare such as chili and spaghetti.
They opened up for breakfast. And it was inexpensive.
Along the way, the Abrahams kept the best of the old-time Reeves,
such as making chicken sandwiches with meat hand-picked from the bird,
not the gelatinous rolled variety. Of course, they kept the world-famous
strawberry pie. Old-timers tell the story of the G.I. from Vietnam who
had been told by a battlefield buddy about Reeves' desserts and who ate
two entire strawberry pies in one sitting.
But the most loyal customers say the real lure is the help.
Gertrude Sweeney, who started working there as a waitress in 1942 at
age 17, said she knows why the place appeals to people. "It feels like
home to them," she said.
1886: Reeves family opens establishment.
1965: Reeves family sells establishment to Abraham family.
1984: Major fire damages building.
1985: Restauraunt/bakery reopens.
1986: Abraham family sells establishment to Buvermo Properties.
Fall 1988: Target date for closing.
