Shakey’s Pizza, a fixture since 1964 along Santa Monica Boulevard (aka Route 66) in West Hollywood, California, will be razed to make way for a Tesla development that includes a supercharger station, drive-in theater and diner.
Esotouric, which runs historic bus tours in Los Angeles and has been an advocate for historic preservation, was among the first to break the news:
RIP to WeHo’s Santa Monica Blvd Shakey’s Pizza, 1964-2002. Locals fave happy hour & birthday marquees no more. Tesla demolishing for restaurant, drive-in and Supercharger EV charging station. This is a Rte 66 loss. https://t.co/px1vGfm0gl pic.twitter.com/0gJGQQiFDy
— Esotouric’s Secret Los Angeles (@esotouric) May 21, 2022
The link in the tweet goes to a Los Angeles City Planning proposal for Tesla’s supercharger, diner and drive-in.
The news also brought the ire of an LA Eater editor:
Not to bury the lede but is Elon Musk going to DEMOLISH the Shakey’s Pizza on Santa Monica?! https://t.co/iGxvJcyKRM
— Farley Elliott (@overoverunder) May 24, 2022
The Shakey’s chain, founded in Sacramento, California, in 1954, once boasted more than 300 locations across the United States by the late 1960s.
According to Wikipedia:
By the early 1970s, Shakey’s had become popular with families and youth sports groups in Southern California. The long rows of picnic tables end-on-end facilitated large groups. Youth sports teams would go to Shakey’s after their weekend games, where the kids could eat pizza and have fun, and the parents could drink beer and socialize. In fact, the advertising motto for Shakey’s was “We serve fun at Shakey’s … also pizza”. One of the features of Shakey’s was its large windows between the dining hall and the kitchen. One could order pizza and then watch as the dough was prepared, sauce and toppings added, and then pizza slid into the oven. Kids enjoyed watching the process and running to tell their parents when the pizza came out of the oven.
Near my Illinois hometown, the Shakey’s also featured live entertainment of guys dressed in ragtime-era costumes, banging out tunes on a banjo and upright piano.
Shakey’s now counts fewer than 60 sites in the U.S. — either in California or Washington state. At least two dozen exist in the L.A. metro.
Shakey’s former prominence reminds one of Stuckey’s, which the founder’s granddaughter is trying to revive. Even a once-ubiquitous chain eventually can inspire nostalgia once it declines.
(Excerpt from Google Street View of the Shakey’s Pizza in West Hollywood, California)
I used to go to a Shakeys on Elmhurst Road in Des Plaines, IL, when I was young. We’d go there for Indian Guides and later Boy Scouts. The thing I remember most about Shakeys is that I usually puked my brains out around 3 am. Eventually, I stopped eating their pizza when I was dragged there. For some reason, I was bummed when it finally closed.