Welcome to Back In The Day, an occasional series wherein Eater takes a look at vintage memorabilia, photos and menus from the past lives of Austin restaurants.
Remember the Night Hawk? You do if you were once a wheeling and dealing politician, businessman, hungry UT student or just plain old-school-Austin enough to have visited one of the classic Austin restaurants before the chain finally closed the doors on the Night Hawk Steakhouse in 1995. (Now it's that Texas Land & Cattle up at I-35 and Highway 290.)
Don't remember the Night Hawk? Virginia B. Wood can help you with that. The first Night Hawk was founded by former Austin mayor Harry Akin in 1932 at the intersection of Congress Avenue and Riverside Drive.
Today, an Ebay seller is offering a little piece of Night Hawk history up for auction: this sugar bowl found at a local estate sale, estimated to date from the 50's or 60's. Another seller has a matchbook cover--you'll recognize The Frisco, no doubt, as they're the last strand of the Night Hawk family operating in Austin today--for the low, low price of $4.02. Short on cash? Relive the dining experience with this vintage video of a family night out at the Night Hawk from the Texas Archive of the Moving Image.
· All Back In The Day Coverage on Eater Austin [-EATX-]
· Night Hawk Matchbook [Ebay]
· Night Hawk Sugar Bowl [Ebay]
· The Flight Of The Nightbird [Austin Chronicle]
"Dinner at the Night Hawk." [Photo: Texas Archive of the Moving Image/Official]
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