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Brigham's fades away
By adamg on Thu, 08/13/2015 - 10:36pm
Maria M. shows us one of the last vestiges of the old Brigham's in Arlington Heights.
"Ice cream was a wicked bargain back in the day!" she notes.
Copyright Maria M. Posted in the Universal Hub pool on Flickr.
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Comments
Is it closing or renaming?
And if the latter, to what?
My google-fu says it should
My google-fu says it should be renaming to Diggums - can't find much official though.
Diggum's
I drove by the other day and they have indeed officially renamed themselves "Diggum's". This was an independent franchise which is how they lasted so long, but they must have finally been forced to stop using the name or been bought out. No word as to whether Brigham's ice cream will still be served...or if Honey Smacks are being added to the offerings.
No more Brigham's ice cream
being sold in wholesale size containers. The only place to get their ice cream is in the supermarket.
As it was the ice cream that made it Brigham's, the restaurants kept the name. Now that they will be selling another brand, the restaurants have changed their names.
There is still another (soon to be called something else) Brigham's in Quincy.
I'm old...
I remember when Brigham's were almost as plentiful around here as Starbucks.
That faithful sign
Nothing like a restaurant refusing to let patron's use the bathroom. Do they not intend for anyone to eat or drink?
Customers only
I believe that means the restrooms are for customers only, not for anyone walking in off the street and then leaving without buying anything (aka, "the public").
No restrooms
I worked for Brigham's all through high school and college at various locations and none of the ones I worked at had public restrooms. The employee restrooms were usually in the basement, not somewhere they wanted the public wandering around. I believe the law in Mass. was that a restaurant only had to have public restrooms if you served alcohol. It might have changed, but most Brigham's were so old they were grandfathered in. Occasionally, in case of emergency (pregnant woman, very small child, etc.) we would let someone use the rest room, but it was against company policy. FYI -- Bartley's Burger Cottage in Harvard Square does not have a public restroom to this day.
Shitty Policy
It's a bad policy -- any store which sells prepared food should have a restroom available to customers. Period. I won't spend money at a restaurant which doesn't have restrooms available but sometimes I don't know before I place my order.
In Harvard Sq, the Greenhouse
In Harvard Sq, the Greenhouse Cafe, which was a decent sized place, didn't have a public rest room. It was a tough thing to find out, especially with limited options in that neighborhood.
Had forgotten about the Greenhouse Cafe
I miss that place! They were pretty tasty (not to be confused with The Tasty) and cheap.
Before the Greenhouse...
... The Pewter Pot
http://www.thecrimson.com/article/1968/4/30/the-pewter-pot-pblbike-howar...
http://old-school-boston.blogspot.com/2010/12/thinking-about-pewter-pot-...
Wasn't the Pewter Pot across
Wasn't the Pewter Pot across the square, where PinkBerry is now?
In the early 70s, Pewter Pot...
...was right by the corner, across the street, north of the newsstand in the middle of Harvard Square.
Greenhouse
I remember the humungous portions. Their greek salad probably had the equivalent calories of a couple of Big Macs.
Why? What would be the
Why? What would be the problem if it were left up to the owner, and customers could decide for themselves if they wanted to go there?
What about food trucks, very small lunch counters, places that sell sandwiches out a window, etc?
I would, however, support a law requiring that hand sanitizer be available for customers if there's no bathroom.
AFAIK, the only statewide requirement for
restaurants to have public restrooms in Massachusetts is if they want to be posted on signing (the blue panels) along the state highway system.
But many specific communities
But many specific communities require it. For instance, see Article 8.9 in the Brookline Town By-laws.
Point taken
Clairifed my original comment to indicate "statewide requirement".
I think it's saying that even
I think it's saying that even customers can't use the rest room. Otherwise, they would say "rest rooms are for customers only." That location is tiny and may not have an easily accessible rest room.
RIP
Spent a lot of time there as a kid
It is Bailey's....
... that I miss much more than Brigham's.
Bailey's for style
Brigham's for the ice cream. Ok--Bailey's gets extra points for the butterscotch. I miss them both.
Oh, yeah! Yummy, yummy, yummy1
Bailey's hot fudge sundaes were fabulous, also! I miss those!
Can anyone make a decent ice cream cone?
I worked at Brigham's at Liberty Tree Mall in Danvers for several years in high school. They had you go through a training schedule to learn how to make ice cream cones - well, not the cones, the scoops for the cones. One scoop for a small, two scoops for a medium, three for a large. And, two different sized scoopers. And, in training we had to weigh the scoops until we got the correct weight each time!
Saved the owners a lot of money from employees who would just dump a lot of ice cream on a cone, and saved a lot of aggravation on the part of customers who received sloppy results.
But Bailey's was always better
The messy hot fudge sundaes were to die for. That, The Tasty, Jack's Joke Shop, The Playboy Club, Combat Zone, West End a real, working Quincy Market, are all gone. Italians are gone from the north end and Irish from Eastie. Schrafts, Boston Confectionery, the Naval Yard, back when books were books, LPs were LPs and Blue Laws just meant you had to buy your booze on Saturday. Now we have a west end devoid of kids playing in the streets, row houses without rats, no more bodies floating in the Fens. The whole city has gone to hell!
You win some, you lose some...
> row houses without rats, no more bodies floating in the Fens.
I guess one can manage to do without these.