WHERE’S BOB THE BIG BOY? Could He Ever Return to Wenatchee?
WHERE’S BOB THE BIG BOY? Could He Ever Return to Wenatchee?
This is a question I was asked with my first article, Remembering Bob The Big Boy And the Stolen Statue in Wenatchee. Before we answer the question, let’s start at the beginning. Because some say that Wenatchee doesn’t need yet another chain restaurant (or any other business), when we should be supporting local mom and pop places. Like many business, Bob the Big Boy was just a small hamburger stand in the San Fernando Valley of California.
Back in 1936, a guy named Robert Wian sold his car for three hundred bucks so he could purchase a tiny stand in Glendale to sell burgers and fries. He called it, Bob’s Pantry. Within a few months, Robert created a burger using two patties in between a bun that was sliced into three, creating the original double-deck hamburger. The first of its kind. And it caught on. Robert named it, The Big Boy Burger, after a local chubby six year old kid who loved the double decker burger and ordered it all the time. In fact, Robert decided to change the name of the restaurant to Bob’s Big Boy.
Because the burger stand was so close to the Warner Brothers studio in Burbank, many studio employees would frequent Bob’s. One studio artist developed the Big Boy mascot that we know today.
Because business was booming, Bob’s bounced to Burbank, and three other locations. It was so popular, there were other’s who wanted to franchise the Big Boy, but would use names other than Bob. Like Frisch’s Big Boy, and Elias’ Big Boy, or Shoney’s Big Boy. in all (over the years) there would be over 25 different names. But on the West Coast and even up into Seattle, Spokane, and Wenatchee, it would be known as Bob’s Big Boy.
In 1956, the comic books that was always handed out to kids for free at the Big Boy restaurants, was called, the Adventures of The Big Boy. Published by Timely Comics…which became Marvel Comics. And yes, the legendary Stan Lee actually wrote many of the Big Boy adventures until 1961.
In 1967, Robert Wian sold to Marriott for 7 million dollars. Think about that. Robert bought the burger stand for just over $300 just over 30 years before.
But Marriott would later sell off the name and locations. On the West Coast, many of the locations were dubbed, JB’s, like the one in Wenatchee. Although Bob’s Big Boy made a come back in some cities like Torrance, California, they would be sold and other restaurants would take its place. In Wenatchee, the former Bob’s location is now (many claim) where Alma’s Mexican Kitchen stands today at 609 N. Wenatchee Ave. Some say it's the old Prospectors Pies building. Has it been so long that we've forgotten?
Many have shared with me their memories and photos of Bob’s Big Boy. Craig Johnson says he has no idea how this Bob the Big Boy statue from the Covina got on top of Royal Oak High School building in 1977.
JJ Quinn was driving outside of Cody, Wyoming where in the middle of nowhere was this Bob the Big Boy statue.
There’s this photo that Todd LePique says he took in a friend’s backyard, who apparently had two? Could one of them be the stolen one from Wenatchee back in 1980 something? Lisa Black remembers as a little kid always climbing on top of the Big Boy statue in Wenatchee….until it was stolen and never seen again.
Jefferson Wilson says he remembers finding this Bob in Norco, CA with a cowboy hat on.
Shelly from East Wenatchee says she never heard of a Bob’s Big Boy until she saw the movie, Austin Powers, where Doctor Evil used an oversized Bob statue as a rocketship. “We planned a trip to Disneyland, and made sure we found a Bob’s.”
Then there’s this one that Willie Bee says he found. “Well, he is a Big Boy!” Haha! Yeah. And the part of Bob’s dog Nugget is played by Babe the Blue Ox.
Could a Bob the Big Boy restaurant ever return to Wenatchee? Not likely. But if you want to bite into an original Double Deck Burger, there are only a few original Bob’s Big Boy Restaurants. Fly into Bob Hope Airport get an Uber and have them take you to the most famous and the oldest Bob’s is the Burbank location at 4211 W. Riverside Drive. The Beatles ate at a corner booth in 1965, which has a plaque marking the booth. A bunch of movies were filmed there like, Al Pacino and Robert De Niro’s 1995 movie, Heart. As well as TV shows like, Mad Men. And taste a memory from your wonder years by biting into a Big Boy Burger.