The Road Island Diner is a rare classic Streamline Moderne 60' x 16' Art Deco diner car restaurant located in the remote mountain city of Oakley, Utah in the United States. It was prefabricated as diner # 1107 in 1939 at the Elizabeth, New Jersey factory of the Jerry O'Mahony Diner Company.
After construction, it was displayed on exhibition at the 1939 World's Fair in New York. After the Fair, It was sold to Al McDermott who had it towed it to Fall River, Massachusetts where it operated for 14 years. In 1953, it was sold to Greek immigrant Tommy Borodemos, who had it transported down the turnpike to Middletown, Rhode Island, where it operated for 4 generations as Tommy's Deluxe Diner. It closed its doors in May 2006 and was purchased in 2007 by Utah businessman, Keith Walker, who transported it to Oakley, Utah. After a year of restoration, it was opened in July 2008. It is said to be the only pre-war, Art-deco streamline (constructed to mimic a rail dining car) diner west of the Mississippi River.
Claimed to have been the "Cadillac" of diner companies because of its steel frame construction, The Jerry O'Mahony Diner Company of Elizabeth, New Jersey whose motto was "In our line, We lead the world" was said to have produced 2,000 diners from 1917 to 1941 with only four pre-war Art-Deco streamline style diners to still be in operation. The smaller 50' x 10' Mickey's Diner serial # 1067 in Saint Paul, Minnesota which is the first diner to be listed on the National Register of Historic Places, the 40' x 16' Collin's Diner serial # 1103 in North Canaan, Ct. and the 1938 Summit Diner in Summit, N.J. The Road Island Diner (O'Mahony Dining Car #1107) was added to the National Register of Historic Places by the National Park Service on August 21, 2009.
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Famous quotes containing the words road and/or island:
“Wherever there is a channel for water, there is a road for the canoe.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)
“The shifting islands! who would not be willing that his house should be undermined by such a foe! The inhabitant of an island can tell what currents formed the land which he cultivates; and his earth is still being created or destroyed. There before his door, perchance, still empties the stream which brought down the material of his farm ages before, and is still bringing it down or washing it away,—the graceful, gentle robber!”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)