Full stomachs, empty hearts Customers, staff bid farewell to iconic North End Sals By: Gabrielle Piché Posted: 7:00 PM CDT Monday, Apr. 24, 2023

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This article was published 24/04/2023 (916 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

Under Salisbury House’s famed red roof on Main Street, cutlery clanked, hugs circulated and customers stopped by for their last nips of food.

“D Day” was Monday’s special, according to a blackboard sign near the cashier. A red velvet cake took up a table, offering customers and staff a cursive thank-you note in icing: “Been a Great 60 Years.”

“Basically anybody who’s anybody has come through here,” said Marty Brudy.

Monday presented Brudy’s final breakfast at 1545 Main St. He, like others filtering through the small cafeteria-style eatery, came to say goodbye and share one last hurrah.

As of late Monday afternoon, Salisbury House’s iconic North End site was officially closed.

Brudy had been visiting the joint for four decades. During the last 13 years — his retirement era — he’d claim a seat at the back nearly daily.

“You walk in here in the morning, and you know everybody,” said Brudy, a member of the self-identified “Wailing Wall.”

He and his “elderly Jewish guy” friends would fill the red seats at the back of the restaurant, opining about everything from politics to religion.

“They used to do this when they wanted their coffee refilled,” said Dessie Ridgwell, repeatedly slamming her coffee mug on a table.

If they didn’t get coffee in time, they’d call the restaurant’s takeout number and ask for coffee to come to the back seats, the former Salisbury House employee said.

“Jerks,” Ridgwell said with a laugh. “It used to be chaotic when I was younger. Used to be six people on nights, hey Pat?”

Beside her, Patricia Duseigne nodded. She, too, saw her fair share of customers during 35 years of work at the restaurant.

Duseigne brought a framed photo to her old workplace Monday: it was her, with Winnipeg music legend Burton Cummings, arm-in-arm at Salisbury House.

“We had a lot of laughs,” Duseigne said. “I’m going to miss it… I’ve missed it since I retired.”

The restaurant has changed since Duseigne and Ridgwell’s years. The pair were around for the 24-hour service — where customers might traipse in wearing suits and dresses after a formal event, and where burgers at 2 a.m. were always an option.

At its peak, the restaurant probably staffed 15 people annually, said general manager Mike Boyce.

On Monday, it was five staff, plus Boyce, with a closing time of 2 p.m. The overnight shift was cut around 10 to 14 years ago.

Pre-COVID-19 pandemic, the location was open until 9 p.m.

“When we came back from the pandemic, (that) was changed,” Boyce said. “There was just not enough staff to run an evening shift… and we really didn’t have the business.”

Salisbury House’s Main Street location was closed for some 18 months at the height of the pandemic. Some long-time customers died; others didn’t come back.

Business picked up once all restrictions lifted, Boyce noted. “I’m going to really miss a lot of our customers, especially our regulars.”

Boyce was stopped by Arlene Levine, who falls under the “regulars” umbrella.

“I just wanted to say goodbye,” she told him. “It’s always nice to go into a place where you feel comfortable. And unfortunately, we don’t have that anymore… It’s so personal (here).”

Staff and customers hugged regularly Monday.

Bev Lecuyer made her rounds — she’d worked the North End site for roughly 48 years. The other staff had clocked in at Salisbury House for spans of 15 to 32 years.

Despite being offered positions at other locations, five of the six North End site staff are retiring, said Brad Kramble, Salisbury House Restaurants of Canada Ltd. chief executive officer.

“We have no idea what the… new (land) owner is going to do,” Kramble told those assembled Monday. “We’ve been able to get away with a lot of stuff.”

Many of the site’s quirks had been grandfathered in, noted Earl Barish, board chairman of Salisbury House.

Such qualities — such as having a bathroom that’s only accessible by passing through the kitchen and going downstairs — will not fly for a new owner. Salisbury House has occupied the Main Street site since 1963, and city legislation has since changed, Barish noted.

“It just didn’t make sense to maintain (this location) on an ongoing basis,” Barish said. “We couldn’t do it any longer.”

However, Salisbury House is “alive and well,” Barish added — it has nine dine-in restaurants in the winter and 12 in the summer (including Winnipeg Goldeyes ballpark and city golf course spaces).

The local chain has opted to not renew leases on its quick-service (or cafeteria-style) eateries, Barish told the Free Press in February. It had six such restaurants; Main Street was the last standing.

“(The North End restaurant) becomes part of our memory base,” Barish said Monday.

The building went up for sale last winter, listed at $421,500.

“There’s a lot of nostalgia behind that location… being one of the mainstays of the Sals chain for many years,” said Shaun Jeffrey, CEO of the Manitoba Restaurant & Foodservices Association. “It’s the loss of an iconic establishment.”

Tim Froese sped around Salisbury House with his camera Monday, eager to document the closure of the notable hub. “Back in the ‘60s when this opened, this place was like fricking Grand Central,” he said.

People recounted their memories all day Monday: Boyce sat at a table where a jukebox once lived; customer Wilma Kraus reckoned the restaurant should become a museum.

Cummings, too, weighed in, forwarding his thoughts to Barish via email.

“Some of my more memorable teenage years virtually ‘revolved’ around the North End Sals. I could never count the memories associated with it,” the email reads.

The shuttering of the restaurant was, “in some ways, emblematic to what’s happening in the North End,” said regular customer Sean Hogan, who works at BUILD Ltd. (Building Urban Industries for Local Development), an organization connecting people facing employment barriers to trades jobs.

“We’ve got a lot of businesses just shutting down. There’s new businesses starting, but we’ve got buildings burning down, we’ve got so much vacancy,” Hogan said, lamenting the lost personal connection.

“It’s not uncommon to come here and order a cheese Nip and get a hug with it.”

gabrielle.piche@winnipegfreepress.com