Little Tavern Shops was a chain of hamburger restaurants in
Baltimore, Maryland
Baltimore ( , locally: or ) is the List of municipalities in Maryland, most populous city in the U.S. state of Maryland, fourth most populous city in the Mid-Atlantic (United States), Mid-Atlantic, and List of United States cities by popula ...
;
Arlington, Virginia
Arlington County is a county in the Commonwealth of Virginia. The county is situated in Northern Virginia on the southwestern bank of the Potomac River directly across from the District of Columbia, of which it was once a part. The county ...
;
Washington, D.C.
)
, image_skyline =
, image_caption = Clockwise from top left: the Washington Monument and Lincoln Memorial on the National Mall, United States Capitol, Logan Circle, Jefferson Memorial, White House, Adams Morgan, ...
; and surrounding areas.
The first Little Tavern opened March 24, 1927, in
Louisville, Kentucky
Louisville ( , , ) is the largest city in the Commonwealth of Kentucky and the 28th most-populous city in the United States. Louisville is the historical seat and, since 2003, the nominal seat of Jefferson County, on the Indiana border ...
, by
Harry F. Duncan. The first Washington location was opened in October 1928 and the first in Baltimore opened its doors in June 1930. By 1937, there were 33 shops open. At the height of the chain, there were almost 50 locations. Duncan sold the chain in 1981. The chain had troubles in the 1990s and the last restaurant closed on April 29, 2008,
although the
Laurel
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location was re-opened that year as Laurel Tavern Donuts after being given the recipe for the burgers,
which it still served as of 2022.
The original slogan of the chain was "Buy 'em by the bag",
and its signs promised "Cold Drinks * Good Coffee". The stores were quite small and could accommodate only a few seated customers, while most business was take-out.
From 1928 to 1931, Little Taverns had block construction and their castle design closely resembled White Castles and White Towers of the same era. Baltimore No. 3, was the first Little Tavern to employ the "
Tudor cottage" design that would become so closely associated with the chain for years to come.
Similar chains
*
White Tower Hamburgers
*
White Castle
*
Krystal
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People
* Krystal Ann Simpson (born 1982), American poet, fashion blogger, DJ, reality television personality, and musician
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*
McDonald's
McDonald's Corporation is an American multinational fast food chain, founded in 1940 as a restaurant operated by Richard and Maurice McDonald, in San Bernardino, California, United States. They rechristened their business as a hambur ...
in its early years
See also
*
White Coffee Pot, another Baltimore-based restaurant
*
List of defunct fast-food restaurant chains
This is a list of defunct fast-food chains. A restaurant chain is a set of related restaurants with the same name in many different locations that are either under shared corporate ownership (e.g., McDonald's in the U.S.) or franchising agreemen ...
External links
Ghosts of Baltimore website]
*
ttp://www.agilitynut.com/eateries/lt.html The adaptive reuse of Little Taverns
Notes
{{Restaurants in Washington, D.C.
Restaurants established in 1927
Restaurants in Baltimore
Restaurants in Washington, D.C.
Regional restaurant chains in the United States
Restaurants in Louisville, Kentucky
Defunct restaurant chains in the United States
1927 establishments in Kentucky
Tudor Revival architecture in the United States
Hamburger restaurants in the United States