I Remember When: The Whip

In 1967, high school junior Jim Hirschauer got a job working as a bus boy at The Whip, a mom and pop restaurant founded in 1940 and located in a Parma Heights house. The large whipped sundaes and beautiful, glossy-haired waitresses made it a popular Friday night hangout for St. Edward High School students. Today, it still boasts the same light-stained, knotty-pine paneling from the '40s and mahogany vinyl booths from the '60s.

The place looked like a house. The owner lived upstairs in an apartment above The Whip. She'd come down when she felt like it to greet the customers.

Before it was a restaurant, The Whip was an old-style ice cream shop. That's how it got its name. The restaurant was known for its strawberry shortcake. It started with soft-serve ice cream piled high. Then the waitresses would add fresh strawberries, cut in half. They'd cover the ice cream with whipped cream — the real kind — and top it with a cherry. Then they'd add a homemade biscuit. That biscuit was delicious.

The basement of the house was where we'd cut the potatoes. You'd put the potatoes in a machine, and it would take all the peels off. Then we'd boil them to make mashed potatoes. We served turkey and mashed potatoes, chicken and mashed potatoes, meat loaf and mashed potatoes.

There was one waitress that I can't forget. She was one or two years older than me. Her name was Linda. She went to Ohio University and gave me a ride home one year. I remember, she kissed me good night — but that's all that happened.

I went back to the restaurant recently. I wanted to ask the waitress if she remembered a Linda from the 1960s. Then I thought, Wait, this could be Linda. I never asked.