Pepé Diaz and his brother Kenny Gilmore started serving breakfast sandwiches and sweet tea at the Howard Deli on Georgia Ave. NW in 1988, when they took over the business.
Its proximity to Banneker High School and Howard University meant a steady stream of students, faculty, and staff every day for decades. Diaz always felt a strong connection to Howard, helping to build floats for its homecoming celebrations in the 1960s.
But when schools in D.C. switched to online learning and students stopped coming by, the bills started to pile up. Making matters worse, Gilmore suffered a stroke last fall and was unable to continue working.
“There was just so much uncertainty and the family decided it wouldn’t be the same without Kenny,” Diaz told DCist/WAMU. “I’ve seen my brother there every day for 33 years.”
So in February, after serving the neighborhood since 1924, Howard Deli closed for the last time.
It’s far from the only long-running business to be felled by the pandemic. Twenty-year-old French restaurant Cafe Montmartre — a beloved gathering place in Capitol Hill for birthdays, anniversaries, and dinners with family — shuttered its doors in May. Gregg’s Barbershop, which served LeDroit Park for over 100 years, closed in August; Twins Jazz, which ran for over 30 years and helped keep U Street NW saucy after the closure of Bohemian Caverns, followed soon after.
One of the more painful closures was The Big Hunt, a Dupont Circle mainstay considered dive-bar royalty. The long-running spot terminated its lease last October, and the building is now for sale.
Opening in 1992 as the brainchild of legendary nightlife titan Joe Englert, The Big Hunt fostered the kind of unpretentious attitude that attracted waves of residents. Subterranean comedy nights, skee-ball tournaments, and arcade games like “Big Buck Hunter” were its calling cards; it was the kind of spot where you could grab a platter of chili cheese fries, plus a drink or two, for less than ten bucks.
“I knew if I went to The Big Hunt, I was going to be able to get an affordable beer, play skee ball, potentially see some comedy, have a smoke on the roof deck and not run into some asshole from one of my classes,” says Connor Beckett McInerney, who frequented the bar as a student at nearby George Washington University. Friends from college he hasn’t spoken to in years reached out to mourn the loss of The Big Hunt, he says.
D.C. resident Allison Hrabar says her life would look totally different had it not been for The Big Hunt allowing imbibers to linger for hours. Years ago, when she was new to D.C., Hrabar saw a group of people smoking on the patio. They turned out to be tenant organizers with the Democratic Socialists of America who regularly conducted business there – in part because of the four dollar beers. After a while, Hrabar became so involved with tenant advocacy through DSA that she enrolled in law school.
“It all started because happy hour at The Big Hunt,” Hrabar says. “You didn’t have to buy a $20 cocktail, and you didn’t have to run into a lot of interns over the summer. It just felt like a very normal place, and it feels like a lot of those places are being lost to COVID.”
But even patron loyalty wasn’t enough to buoy some businesses, particularly those downtown. A report released last fall by the Downtown Business Improvement District estimated that in just 138 square blocks downtown, restaurant sales were only reaching 30%-50% of 2019 levels.
Diaz says he will miss his regular customers and their conversations about politics over coffee in the morning, but he’ll miss the students the most. They would come in for a bacon, egg and cheese croissant with jelly and a “ghetto iced tea” — brewed bags of Lipton tea with a ton of sugar. When chocolate chip cookies were added to the mix, that was a signal: “That’s how we knew it must be exam time,” Diaz says. “Sugar rush with the tea and cookies.”
Michael Franklin, a communications major in his senior year at Howard, says upperclassmen advised him during his freshman year to check out the deli. The famed breakfast sandwich-and-cookie combo was his go-to order.
“It’s really just a great way to be a part of that culture, because it’s something that connects the community throughout generations,” Franklin says. He laments that future students won’t come to know that feeling, too.