An iconic South Jersey diner serves its last meal

Dwayne Davis headed around the corner from his apartment to Cherry Hill Diner on Sunday afternoon, just as he had done hundreds of times before. He planned to order his usual: a plate of waffles and eggs, with some soup to go.

“It was going to be my Last Supper there, and I was ready,” said Davis, 62. “They know how I like it there.”

He never got to have it. After slinging classics like chipped beef and shrimp salad for 55 years, the shining neon castle known as Cherry Hill Diner served its last dish well before closing time on Sunday. The Route 38 landmark will be replaced by a car wash.

By 3 p.m., the place had run out of food, emptied out by a week of emotional regulars crowding in for one last burger or just one more cup of coffee. Davis showed up just after 4 p.m. — and had to content himself with a menu to take home, given to him by the staff as a souvenir.

“It’s very sad. It’s the end of an era,” said Margie Buckley, a server at the diner for about four years. “There have been a lot of tears around here.”

Emotions ran high among the staff, whom Buckley described as “family,” despite their various national origins and ages, which ranged from 17 to Buckley’s 67.

Locals, too, are both upset and befuddled about the diner’s fate. As one decades-long regular, John Smarkola, told The Inquirer in January, “We need another car wash like we need another Wawa.”

That is: Not at all. After all, there’s another car wash just across the street.

Others worry about what will become of the regulars, many of whom are elderly and rely on the diner as a kind of community center.

“Older people go in there morning and night for their coffee and tea. What goes through my mind is, I wonder if these people are just going to be home alone,” said Davis. “This is going to have a terrible effect on people on a lot of different levels.”

The diner’s demise isn’t the outcome that anyone wanted — including management. Co-owner Dimitrios “Jimmy” Manetas, who owns a host of diners across New Jersey, said that at 68, he just needed to downsize. Manetas, who has owned the Cherry Hill Diner for 20 years, tried for two years to find a buyer who would keep the diner as is, but in the end, he couldn’t.

“The car wash came in and gave us the right price,” he said. “I’m not too happy, but we had no choice.”

Buckley, for her part, had no hard feelings against management, whom she described as the “most respectful and respectable people” she’s ever worked for. True to that description, the owners did their best not to let anyone go, placing staff at one of Manetas’ other restaurants, Seven Star Diner in Sewell and Jimmy’s American Grill in Bordentown.

But still, on Sunday, after the last mozzarella sticks were fried and the final burger was flipped, the mood at Cherry Hill Diner was bittersweet.

“I’m very upset, I’m very depressed today, to tell you the truth,” said Manetas, who was celebrating, mourning, and enjoying one last dinner with his staff in Cherry Hill.

“Diners are like my babies.”