Company plans to bring Blue Star Diner back to its 1950s luster

Dulles-based Belleville Diners last week put a contract on the property and hopes to close on it within about two months. Then, the company will embark on restoring it, said Michael Lessin, managing director of Belleville Diners.

"Our plan is to restore that diner back to how it originally looked," Lessin said. "We're big believers in keeping the diners original and true to how a classic, American diner should look."

Isabella Rossellini and David Lynch sat at a booth there while filming parts of the movie "Zelly and Me" in 1987. "Blue Plate Special: The American Diner Cookbook," written by Elizabeth McKeon and Linda Everett in 1996, features recipes and a brief overview of the diner.

For 46 years, the restaurant was owned by the Blentsons. Angelo Blentson died in 1991.

A small kitchen fire closed the place for about a year and a half in December 2005. It reopened in 2007 under new management.

Shortly after Fannie Blentson died in September, the property went on the market, and the restaurant closed in January.

It caught the eye of Belleville Diners, which keeps tabs on old diners in Virginia.

"There are so few of them remaining," Lessin said.

One of its related companies is restoring the 1948 Triangle Diner in Winchester, which was recently added to the Virginia Landmarks Register and is awaiting inclusion on the National Register of Historic Places, Lessin said.

Lessin estimates it'll take about $200,000 to fix up the Blue Star.

"In general, the building is in good shape," Lessin said. "It really just needs to be cleaned up a bit. It'll probably take about six months to a year to get it fixed up and open."

The Blue Star has a sloped roof that was added to the building. Other than that, the key diner components are there and historically correct. The booths are original, along with the countertop, curved Formica ceiling and exterior of stainless steel and blue enamel.

The neon sign out front will need to be fixed.

"The 'D-I-N' lights up. We plan to get the 'E' and the 'R' to work as well," Lessin said.

Once it opens, it'll serve up the usual diner fare, with an emphasis on quality.

"A lot of diners in America, I think their food quality has gone down in the last few decades," Lessin said. "We're passionate about a quality product. A lot of people eat at diners every day, and we want it to be good for them."

Pat Perkinson, 67, was delighted to hear the old diner will be revived.

"It's too precious of a piece of history to just ignore and push on the side somewhere," the Newport News resident said.

Perkinson "fell in love with Fannie's food, and then Fannie," she said. Perkinson, a retired school teacher, even worked there summers and one night a week because she enjoyed the place so much, she said.

During the restaurant's heyday, the place was packed at lunchtime and from 4:30 p.m. until close, but it wasn't the same after the 2005 fire, Perkinson said.

Belleville plans to set up a Facebook page and Web site (bluestardiner.com) for folks to keep track of the progress.

"We like to get suggestions from people as well," Lessin said. "If anyone has old photos, we would love to get as many old photos as possible, just so we can see how it used to look to make sure that all the restoration that we do is historically correct."

Blue Star history

1961: Angelo and Fannie Blentson buy a prefabricated diner building and open the business in Woodstock, Va.

1963: The Blentsons move the restaurant to Newport News.

1988: Isabella Rossellini and David Lynch appear in a booth at the Blue Star in the movie "Zelly and Me."

1996: "Blue Plate Special: The American Diner Cookbook" is published, including a recipe and history of the Blue Star.

December 2005: A small fire breaks out at the restaurant, and it closes.

May 2007: The Blue Star Diner opens under new management.

January 2010: The diner closes.

February 2010: The property is under contract to a buyer who plans to restore and reopen the diner.

Copyright © 2010, Newport News, Va., Daily Press
 

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   I just checked, Susan, and you're still on the list, but there are a number of things at play here.

   For the past week, the amount of mail I received was so low, I only found it necessary to issue Newsletters every other day.  It was quite strange, and I began to wonder if my mail was reaching anyone at all.

   Yesterday morning, I noticed that gmail was not importing my mail from Yahoo, but they finally resolved that after about 18 hours.

   Late yesterday afternoon we began The Big Server Transition - which after a great beginning is not going quite as smoothly as we had hoped.  The entire site is now completely off line, and we're in the process of restarting it with Awardspace.com (which should resolve the numerous issues we've endured with 00FreeHost.com).

   It will then be called simply: www.nnhs65.com.

   When it's up and ready, I'll send out a Big Announcement.

   Thanks for checking, Susan!

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   It certainly sounds like a worthwhile effort to me, Shari! Thanks!

She paused a moment and looked up as if trying to remember it in detail, and she smiled even more.

"When we said, 'I wish you enough,' we were wanting the other person to have a life filled with just enough good things to sustain them." Then turning toward me, she shared the following as if she were reciting it from memory.

I wish you enough sun to keep your attitude bright no matter how gray the day may appear.

I wish you enough rain to appreciate the sun even more.

I wish you enough happiness to keep your spirit alive and everlasting.

I wish you enough pain so that even the smallest of joys in life may appear bigger.

I wish you enough gain to satisfy your wanting.

I wish you enough loss to appreciate all that you possess.

I wish you enough hellos to get you through the final good-bye.

She then began to cry and walked away.

They say it takes a minute to find a special person, an hour to appreciate them, a day to love them; but then an entire life to forget them.

- Rex Barker

   Thanks again, Shari!

   Thanks so much, Sweetie! In all humility, I must tell you that ordinarily I ace these quizzes, but with this one I did not fare so well. In fact, I missed an outrageous 8 out of 30.

   Being of a positive nature, however, I choose to interpret that as meaning that I'm not really old enough to remember these things, after all!