Manufacturer: Syracuse China
User: The Homestead, Maywood, Illinois
Date of plate: 1968
Notes: The Homestead restaurant was located at 8305 West North Avenue in the Chicago suburb of Maywood, Illinois. Ashley Hugh Ricketts founded the restaurant in 1938 or 1939 (according to his testimony before Congress in 1957 about improper labor activities), and it closed in 2003.
Working along with Ricketts was his wife Kathryn Peters Ricketts. An article on the RememberWrigleyField.com website indicates the Ricketts family "owned a string of Chicagoland restaurants from 1898 to 2003. They were the first to advertise on the famed Waveland Avenue rooftop out Wrigley." During the Congressional interview Ricketts said he was the third generation of his family to work in/own restaurants.
The restaurant had no connection to The Homestead resort in Hot Springs, Virginia.
The coupe plate has a drawing of The Homestead restaurant in monotone gray green. The crest on the matchbook is the same as that on the detail of the plate, above.
For unrelated venue with the same name:
Homestead, The – Virginia, by Buffalo and Syracuse
Sources:
Chicago Tribune
Remember Wrigley Field
1957 Hearings Before the Select Committee on Improper Activities in the Labor or Management Field
Contributor:
Bruce Bills, plate photos