This story originally appeared in LV Daily, Little Village’s Monday-Friday email newsletter. Sign up to have it delivered for free to your inbox.
Republicans running for president are moving into full-campaign mode in Iowa as the state GOP hosts its annual Lincoln Dinner fundraiser on Friday night, featuring 10-minute speeches from 13 candidates (including Donald Trump), and Gov. Reynolds announces the 12 candidates (not including Trump) she will appear with at the Iowa State Fair. But one iconic campaigning spot is currently unavailable for any Republican hopeful eager for a Reagan-adjacent photo op.
Hamburg Inn No. 2 in Iowa City has closed indefinitely for the second time this year. According to a sign posted on the restaurant’s door, “Due to staffing issues, WE ARE TEMPORARILY closed until further notice.” But reporting by Iowa Public Radio’s Zachary Oren Smith shows the restaurant’s problems go beyond staffing issues.
“Since April, the restaurant has been in court over allegedly failing to make payments to a food supplier,” Smith reported. “U.S. Foods says Hamburg owner Michael Lee owes it nearly $15,000.”
“Lee is also behind on his property taxes and risks losing the property completely. Last month, the Hamburg was bought off the auction block for more than $16,000. Lee could still maintain ownership, but he only has two years to pay what he owes.”
At the end of last December, managers at Hamburg Inn announced the restaurant was closed indefinitely starting on Jan. 8. The managers cited a series of ongoing problems, including a ruptured sewer line that left Hamburg without working toilets, and the restaurant not making enough money to cover operating expenses or continue paying the staff.
The managers said those problems were compounded by their inability to get in touch with owner Michael Lee. Unsure if Lee was even in the country, they came to the conclusion that the situation was unsustainable, and decided to close the restaurant’s doors at the beginning of the new year.
“The bottom line is I can’t stay open if I can’t pay my employees and I’m not going to ask them to work for free,” Ajax Ehl, the then-manager told the Press-Citizen on Dec. 30. Ehl had worked at the restaurant for 18 years before becoming manager earlier in 2022.
The following day, an attorney representing Lee issued a statement saying Hamburg Inn was not closing, but would be “operating at reduced hours … for the next few weeks to make updates.”
“There are no plans to close the restaurant,” the attorney said.
One day after that statement, the attorney issued another one. The new statement said, “it has been discovered that there are maintenance issues that will require the restaurant to close temporarily for repairs.”
According to that statement, “Due to these issues, the Hamburg Inn restaurant will be closed temporarily for physical and spiritual repairs, and will reopen by February 1, 2023 in time for Valentine’s Day.”
The restaurant did not reopen until Feb. 22.
When it reopened, Hamburg had a new staff, including a new manager. The previous managers “were let go because they decided to close the restaurant without talking to Michael,” the new manager told Little Village.
Michael Lee bought Hamburg Inn No. 2 from David Panther, the son of the original owners. Panther, who grew up eating at Hamburg Inn, bought it from his parents when they retired in 1979, and ran it until he sold it to Lee in 2016.
After buying the restaurant, Lee has frequently talked about plans for expanding the Hamburg Inn beyond its one location, and possibly even franchising it. At the time of the purchase, Lee told the Gazette he was considering opening a second location in his hometown of Shanghai.
Lee believed that the once-every-four-years attention Hamburg got from the political candidates and the national media trailing them gave the restaurant a national, even international, appeal that would make it franchisable.
It was Ronald Reagan who first made Hamburg a popular political photo-op site. Accompanied by a swarm of reporters, he visited the Linn Street diner while campaigning ahead of the 1980 Iowa Caucus. It was a clever piece of political image-making, meant to demonstrate the millionaire former movie star and one-time governor of the country’s most populous state was just a regular guy who enjoyed the atmosphere in a Midwestern diner.
The photos and TV footage of Reagan at the Hamburg played well nationally, but it wasn’t enough to help him win in Iowa. Reagan finished second in the caucus, behind George H.W. Bush. Still, Hamburg Inn became a standard campaign stop for politicians with presidential ambitions.
The restaurant was famous enough to be featured on a 2006 episode of The West Wing. (In fine TV tradition, the episode was not actually filmed at the Hamburg Inn, or in Iowa.) It also remained Iowa City enough to allow a low-budget indie comedy called Zadar! Cow from Hell to use it as a filming location in the late ’80s.
None of that guaranteed success in attempting to expand the business. Lee did open a second location, also called Hamburg Inn No. 2, on Iowa City’s east side in September 2017. That location closed in February 2020.
Lee has not issued any statements regarding the restaurant’s current problem, and his attorney declined to comment in response to questions from IPR.
Hamburg Inn is the second Northside restaurant to announce its indefinite closure this month. On July 17, Goosetown Cafe owners Peter and Kathy Kessler shared “A Farewell To All Guests & Friends” on Facebook, thanking customers for their support over the past five years.
