Here's something you might be interested in.
Ask a Hipster — Advice you didn't know you needed
Big Screen — Movie commentary
Blurt — Music's inside track
Booze News — San Diego spirits
Classical Music — Immortal beauty
Classifieds — Free and easy
Close to Home — What it’s like on the street where you live
Cover Stories — Front-page features
Drinks All Around — Bartenders' drink recipes
Excerpts — Literary and spiritual excerpts
Feast! — Food & drink reviews
Feature Stories — Local news & stories
Fishing Report — What’s getting hooked from ship and shore
From the Archives — Spotlight on the past
Golden Dreams — Talk of the town
The Gonzo Report — Making the musical scene, or at least reporting from it
Letters — Our inbox
Movies@Home — Local movie buffs share favorites
Movie Reviews — Our critics' picks and pans
Musician Interviews — Up close with local artists
Neighborhood News from Stringers — Hyperlocal news
News Ticker — News & politics
Obermeyer — San Diego politics illustrated
Outdoors — Weekly changes in flora and fauna
Overheard in San Diego — Eavesdropping illustrated
Poetry — The old and the new
Reader Travel — Travel section built by travelers
Reading — The hunt for intellectuals
Roam-O-Rama — SoCal's best hiking/biking trails
San Diego Beer — Inside San Diego suds
SD on the QT — Almost factual news
Sheep and Goats — Places of worship
Special Issues — The best of
Street Style — San Diego streets have style
Surf Diego — Real stories from those braving the waves
Theater — On stage in San Diego this week
Tin Fork — Silver spoon alternative
Under the Radar — Matt Potter's undercover work
Unforgettable — Long-ago San Diego
Unreal Estate — San Diego's priciest pads
Your Week — Daily event picks
Tom Arnold's Old Places: Niederfrank's Ice Cream
Longtime one-man operation is now a two-woman show
The idea of writing about old places in San Diego County has been something I’ve been mulling around for years – but I kept putting it off because coming up with the parameters was a lot harder than I imagined. In the end, I decided to focus on businesses and restaurants that have been in the same place, with the same name and line of business, for at least 50 years.
Established 1948. Equal parts ice cream parlor and factory, Niederfrank’s has been churning out homemade ice cream — made with such exotic flavors as avocado, apple strudel, licorice and Thai tea — for more than 75 years. It all started when Elmer Niederfrank opened a street-front ice cream shop on a small side street two blocks east of busy National City Boulevard. At the time, the small South Bay industrial town of National City was home to thousands of defense workers; the area was a hotbed of military activity due to the nearby shipyards and Naval Base San Diego. National City Boulevard was nicknamed “Mile of Bars” because of all the drinking establishments catering to lonesome, homesick sailors. For a quarter century, according to a Star News article, Niederfrank ran a one-man operation, making ice cream alone in the workroom of his storefront. His original 10-gallon batch freezer is still in use today, while the business — acquired in 1995 by two young women — still prides itself on the fact that everything is made on site, including the ice cream, the waffle cones, and the sorbet and ice cream pies that have since been added to the menu.
Editor's note: The Reader first visited Niederfrank's in 1975. Ed Bedford learned about the founder's ghost in 2012. Ian Anderson stopped in nine years later.
Here's something you might be interested in.
Tom Arnold's Old Places: Niederfrank's Ice Cream
Longtime one-man operation is now a two-woman show
Tom Arnold's Old Places: Niederfrank's Ice Cream
Longtime one-man operation is now a two-woman show
The idea of writing about old places in San Diego County has been something I’ve been mulling around for years – but I kept putting it off because coming up with the parameters was a lot harder than I imagined. In the end, I decided to focus on businesses and restaurants that have been in the same place, with the same name and line of business, for at least 50 years.
Established 1948. Equal parts ice cream parlor and factory, Niederfrank’s has been churning out homemade ice cream — made with such exotic flavors as avocado, apple strudel, licorice and Thai tea — for more than 75 years. It all started when Elmer Niederfrank opened a street-front ice cream shop on a small side street two blocks east of busy National City Boulevard. At the time, the small South Bay industrial town of National City was home to thousands of defense workers; the area was a hotbed of military activity due to the nearby shipyards and Naval Base San Diego. National City Boulevard was nicknamed “Mile of Bars” because of all the drinking establishments catering to lonesome, homesick sailors. For a quarter century, according to a Star News article, Niederfrank ran a one-man operation, making ice cream alone in the workroom of his storefront. His original 10-gallon batch freezer is still in use today, while the business — acquired in 1995 by two young women — still prides itself on the fact that everything is made on site, including the ice cream, the waffle cones, and the sorbet and ice cream pies that have since been added to the menu.
Editor's note: The Reader first visited Niederfrank's in 1975. Ed Bedford learned about the founder's ghost in 2012. Ian Anderson stopped in nine years later.
Comments