The Workingman's Friend - Indianapolis

On my list of places to try for quite sometime is a place in Indianapolis called the Workingman's Friend.  They've been in business for nearly 100 years, 3 generations of family members have owned the place, and they're famous for their flat-grilled double cheeseburgers.  I was driving down to Indy from Chicago and decided along the way to find the Workingman's Friend to have lunch that day.  

Louie Stamatkin was a 21-year-old immigrant from Macedonia when he left that war torn country exactly 100 years ago to find a better life in the U.S.  After being processed through Ellis Island, Stamatkin ended up in Indianapolis.  He wanted to open a little tavern/diner and he found a small house with dirt floors and pillars holding up the ceiling near the old Baltimore and Ohio railyard north and west of downtown Indianapolis.  He opened his little tavern - the Belmont Lunch - in 1918 with most of his customers working at the railway roundhouse just north and east of his building.

When Prohibition hit the next year, that didn't deter Louie as he made bootleg whiskey and sold it under the counter at his little establishment.  Word of Louie's bootleg whiskey went far and wide, usually to travelers who used the B&O railways to get back and forth across the nation.  His bootleg whiskey was so popular that when a certain circus would come to Indianapolis they would call ahead and order 200 half-pint bottles of whiskey from Louie.  

When the Depression hit in 1930, many of the railyard workers were living payday to payday and usually didn't have extra cash for something to eat.  Louie would let the workers run tabs for food - he wrote nothing down and it was all done on the honor system.  When payday would come for the workers they would diligently walk over to Louie's diner and pay him what they could.  The workers began to refer to Louie as "the workingman's friend."  

Louie's little diner/tavern made it through the Depression, Prohibition and World War II.  When Louie passed away in 1946, his sons Carl and Earl took over.  Within five years they had built, basically, a new structure around the old house without having to close the doors.  They also changed the name of the place from the Belmont Diner to the Workingman's Friend in tribute to their father.  The interior of the Workingman's Friend looks pretty much the same today as it was in the early 50's.  (The restrooms were updated a few years ago.)

Carl and Earl didn't always see eye-to-eye on business decisions and Earl ended up leaving the Workingman's Friend in 1965.  He eventually started up a Burger Chef franchise which eventually became a Hardee's.  Earl didn't have any children so upon his death, the Hardee's franchise was willed to two of Carl's children from his first marriage.

Carl's ten children came from two different mothers - Mary (Monroe) Stamatkin was the mother to Linda, Larry, Gary and Terry; while Mary Alice (Gill) Stamatkin was mother to Becky, Louie, Steve, Chris, Earl and Danny.  Mary Alice Gill came to work at the Workingman's Friend in the early 50's.  She had a full-time job at Bell Telephone, but started to work in the kitchen on a part-time basis.  She eventually quit her job at Bell and became the full-time cook at the Workingman's Friend.  And soon thereafter, she ended up marrying Carl Stamatkin.  

Steaks, stews and Balkin salads were the main draw in the 60's, but suddenly Mary Alice's double cheeseburgers became the rage with the politicians, sports figures, working-class patrons and captains of industry who came to the Workingman's Friend for lunch.  In the 60's and 70's, medical students from the nearby Indiana University School of Medicine would frequent the place for 10 cent sandwich and beer specials.  

Carl had a stroke in the early 90's that forced him to retire from the bar.  Mary Alice cut back her kitchen duties to help take care of Carl and her daughter, Becky, took over the kitchen duties.  Carl's son, Terry, was a fixture behind the bar for over 25 years before he tragically passed away not long ago.  (Carl passed in 2004 and Mary Alice peacefully passed away in 2008.)  Today, Becky Stamatkin is the third generation family member to run the Workingman's Friend.  Her partner, Shelley Grover, is the general manager of the place.  

l It was Shelley Grover who greeted me in a very matter of fact way when I sat down at the bar after I arrived at the Workingman's Friend.  (see map) "Ever been here before," she asked in a somewhat curt and gruff manner.  After I told her I had not, she said somewhat tersely, "This is a cash only place, we're famous for our double cheeseburgers, onion rings, and our 32 ounce fishbowl beers."   She was definitely no-nonsense in her demeanor and somewhat hard edged.  I ordered up a 32 ounce draft beer and a double cheeseburger.  "No onion rings," she inquired brusquely.  Nope, that's it.  A big beer and a double cheeseburger.

There's still a number of items in the Workingman's Friend that date back to the 50's.  The cash register, juke box and bar are all the same as they were when the Stamatkin brothers remodeled the place.  The poles in the center of the dining area are the original support poles from the original building from the early 20th century.  The tables and chairs from the 50's were replaced when they remodeled the bathrooms a little over 10 years ago.  The place is what I would affectionately call a dive bar.  

There's more than just double cheeseburgers and onion rings on the menu at the Workingman's Friend.   They also have chicken sandwiches, pork tenderloins, Cincinnati-style chili (with pasta), and appetizers such as fried pickles, chicken fingers and fried zucchini.  For the diet conscious, they also feature a diet plate consisting of a burger without a bun, tomato slice and cottage cheese.  And they have fries - seasoned, sweet or regular.  It's typical working class bar food.  

My burger came out and Shelley served it to me wordlessly, placing ketchup and mustard in front of me.  I don't know if she was always that inhospitable or if she was having a bad day, but I was beginning to think that she didn't care for me.  I was about halfway through my burger when she grabbed both the mustard and ketchup bottles from in front of me and plunked them down in front of someone else.  I just had to laugh silently at how brash she seemed to be.  

The burger, itself, was pretty damned good.  They use an 80/20 mix in their beef at the Workingman's Friend and the burgers are flat-grilled.  The burger patties had a crispy outer layer.  There was a small flat two-sided bun in between the burger patties which both had slices of American cheese on top of them.  While I don't care for the crispy nature of flat-grilled burgers, I liked the burger a lot.  I was glad I didn't get the onion rings because the double cheeseburger was more than enough of a meal for me.  It stayed with me a good portion of the day.  

Other than the bartender's rather hard attitude, I liked my visit to the Workingman's Friend.  Heck, with that kind of bar you'd almost expect that kind of attitude.   Workingman's Friend is the kind of place that appeals not only to the working class but to professionals and ordinary people, as well. Yeah, it's a dive, but it's a great throwback place and there's a lot of history in the building.  And it just so happens that the Workingman's Friend has one of the best burgers in Indianapolis. 

Comments

[John Caine]

The Workingman's friend is my favorite burger joint in all of Indianapolis, I visit the establishment frequently, my favorite thing to get is the giant double cheeseburger and onion rings, and of course a frosty fishbowl. I look forward to my trips to the Workingman's, not only for the great food but also for the staff that take the time out of there day to remember what I get when I walk in the door, they are the same faces I see every time I go in. I always sit at the bar when I go in and almost always have the bartender you speak of and not once has she ever been rude to me in the manner you have suggested, and personally I think it was mean and hurtful to slander someone personally by name on your blog, that sir, was a little harsh from yourself.

[J.D. Carter]

I don't think there was any slander involved in this post. I've been to Workingman's Friend many times and I know exactly who he's talking about. I didn't know her name until now, tho. She does have a hard attitude but I don't think she is being malicious or the guy who wrote the blog is being malicious either. I can see where she can be a little hard at times but that doesn't stop me from going back and having a double cheeseburger with onion rings. This guy captured everything I see at Workingman's Friend.

[Kevin Betz]

The Workingman's Friend is an Indianapolis institution! This extensive history, if accurate, only adds to the legend of The WMF. For 100 years, it's been as solid as its concrete blocks for a good burger and a cold beer. It's not about phony smiles and fancy service. It's about being a "regular", being slow to warm up and being unique. From the art deco glass bar to the 100-year-old two-handed frozen fishbowls, to the "cash-only" rules, it's in essence really a family-run neighborhood tavern at its heart. Until you earn the title "regular," you don't necessarily merit too much attention or niceties -- as it should be. And consider yourself lucky to get a fishbowl! Shelley is just fine! "Gruff" just means the visitor/reviewer has gone to too many fancy Chicago restaurants. How many of those restaurants have remained in business for 100 years?

We love it so much that we started a scholarship named in its honor at Ivy Tech. The Workingman's Friend Scholarship pays tuition every semester for a hard-working and deserving student at Ivy Tech every year. Long-live The Workingman's Friend!