By Christina Abt
Buffalo, NY – Today I have a story to tell you. It's a series of vignettes actually about family and celebrations and place.
On a crisp September afternoon in 1948, a distinguished and well respected Buffalo attorney and a young business woman born and raised in South Buffalo, joined with their family and friends for an elegantly stylish wedding ceremony and reception. The event was held at one of Buffalo's most treasured restaurants reknown for the pillared Mansion that housed it, the sumptuous d cor within and the upscale cuisine served.
One unusually mild October Saturday in 1950, a young man from Buffalo's West Side and a young woman from the rural township of Java Center stood together at St. Joseph's New Cathedral to unite as husband and wife. Following the ceremony, the newlyweds and invited guests relocated to this same restaurant for a lavish wedding dinner.
On a classic June evening in 1968, a young man from the Village of Kenmore, the oldest of his family, strode across the stage at Kleinhans Music Hall, in white dinner jacket attire, to receive his graduate's diploma from St. Joseph's Collegiate Institute. In celebration, the graduate and his family and friends made their way to this same restaurant for festive food and drink.
On a tragically historic day in 1971, this landmark restaurant burned to the ground creating a hole in the fabric of Buffalo and it's society that remained for two years, until a new Tudor Style mansion/restaurant rose in its place.
In late 1989, an accomplished young chef, a top graduate from the Culinary Institute of America, returned home to Buffalo with his wife and son to assume the executive kitchen responsibilities at the revamped and revitalized restaurant.
In November of 1992, a young woman, newly graduated from college, began her professional career as the manager of this restaurant's banquet facility. The following May she met a young man affiliated with the restaurant. They fell in love and married.
Each of these memories are part and parcel of my family's personal Park Lane Restaurant history. They are also moments I've been reflecting upon since hearing the news of the venerable restaurant's year end closing. While I fully understand that everything -- even restaurants -- have a season, there's something about the closing of this particular upscale eatery that is definitely disquieting and in some ways, heartbreaking.
The Park Lane was never just a restaurant. It was a Buffalo institution. From it's earliest days of Peter Gust Economu sweeping through the dining room gallantly kissing women's hands and demanding excellence from the staff, The Park Lane was THE place for Western New Yorkers to celebrate and enjoy life. And while razing it to make way for a high class condo may be the next logical evolutionary step in the fabeled property's existence, for many like me, the process feels more like a giant step backwards.
For seven decades the Park Lane was a part of my family's life and my community's history. And on December 31, 2006, when the final drink is poured, the last dinner served and undoubtedly a very bittersweet rendition of Auld Lang Syne rendered, it will be hard to imagine that the revered tradition of all that was The Park Lane will be nothing more than a collection of treasured moments safe guarded only within the heartfeltklk memories of Western New Yorkers who once gathered there.
"Heart and Soul" with Commentator Christina Abt is a monthly feature of WBFO.
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