For $35,000 or maybe less (it’s been listed on Facebook Market for 31 weeks), you can buy the former Rissers Diner and do whatever you like with it.
Risser’s opened around 1980 in Stouchsburg, Pennsylvania, about halfway between Reading and Lebanon. The restaurant closed around 2014. The diner is now located in Womelsdorf, Pennsylavania – 3.5 miles from where the diner onces operated.
According the diner’s listing, it was manufactured by the Fodero Dining Car Company.
Architect Michael Wyetzner explains how the design of classic American diners reflects different eras in US history.
The classic American diner shape is reminiscent of a train car because the earliest diners were actually converted railroad dining cars. Booth seating, counter seating and an open kitchen are all design elements that originated from the necessity of serving food in a train car.
Diners adapted to the rise of cars in the 1920s. Diners needed to be eye-catching to attract drivers passing by on highways. Googie architecture is a famous example of this adaptation. Diners in this style are often brightly colored and have signage that is designed to be seen from a distance. Some Googie diners even incorporated car culture into their designs by having buildings with shapes that resembled cars or having features like conveyor belts that would bring food out to cars.
The Space Age influenced Googie architecture to take on a more futuristic feel. Buildings began to look like flying saucers or other space-age shapes. The video mentions the Theme Building at LAX and the Space Needle in Seattle as examples of Googie architecture from the Space Age.
The video ends by explaining how the Googie style fell out of fashion in the 1960s. The optimism of the Space Age came to an end with the Vietnam War and the fight for civil rights. Diners, which had started out as a futuristic vision, became a symbol of a more nostalgic time. So today, when we see a classic diner, we are seeing a combination of architectural influences from the 1920s, 1950s, and 1960s.
