Film Inspired by similar restaurants serving motorists in Los Angeles, Mel Weiss and Harold Dobbs founded Mel’s Drive-In restaurants in 1947 in San Francisco, California. Night and day, hordes of patrons that fancied dining-in-your-car came early and often. It didn’t take long for the first restaurant to multiply into eleven. In 1972, the original Mel’s located at 140 South Van Ness in San Francisco was selected ( read more... )

Stores The Shopping Spree article series continues with part 11. As usual we head back 50 years or so to visit the stylish, kitschy and sometimes strange looking malls and shopping centers of the past. This time we take a look at Montgomery Ward, Woolco, Randhurst Mall and Colonial Plaza in Orlando. Like most of us retro lovers know, time stands still in photographs, but progress ( read more... )