Greetings family, friends and neighbors!  Today's rambling is about a century old roadside attraction with a Disney connection that may surprise you..........Bill

Roadside Distractions

TAM O’SHANTER INN

“Since 1922 this distinctive eating place has been renowned for the excellence of it’s hamburger, salads, spaghetti and split pea soup. Growing patronage over the years attests the excellence of

the cuisine”

2980 Los Feliz Blvd.   3 blocks east of Griffith Park  Los Angeles, Calif. - Circa 1940’s Postcard

A popular way of attracting the attention of passing motorists to a diner, coffee shop or roadside attraction in Los Angeles in the 1920’s and 30’s was with the use of novelty architecture. Buildings were often constructed in the shape of the things that were being sold there. Hot Dog Stands were built in the shape of giant hot dogs, coffee shops in the shape of oversize coffee pots, and fresh orange juice from Giant Oranges…you get the picture. “Mimic” architecture was a popular trend and dozens of unusual and wacky roadside attractions sprang up throughout the Southern California including unique architectural statements intended to instantly catch the eye including Grauman’s Chinese Theater, and Hollywood’s Egyptian and Mayan theaters. 

Lawrence Frank and Walter Van de Kamp’s Tam O’Shanter Inn featured a playful fairy tale cottage style exterior designed by noted Hollywood set designer and architect Harry Oliver in 1922 and constructed by movie studio carpenters. Frequent lunchtime patrons to the medieval inspired eatery were Walt Disney and his animation staff since their newly built nearby Hyperion Studio was built on a budget and didn’t include a cafeteria. Dubbed the “Disney Commissary”, Disney would seek out booth 35 in the corner of the main dining room featuring English and Scottish weapon for his favorite meal of grilled ground hamburger on buttered and toasted white bread.

Tam O’ Shanter, is one of Los Angeles’s oldest restaurants still run by the same family in it’s original location. Throngs of Disney fans visit the restaurant for it’s famous prime rib and Yorkshire pudding and to seek seating at the tribute table with a few well warn character etchings and a plaque that reads “This was a favorite spot of Walt Disney and his Imagineers”. Several original framed caricatures of the proprietors being thanked by Disney crew drawn by an original animator John Hench and signed by Walt Disney hang nearby.

It’s difficult to dispute local lore that the century old story book roadside attraction, Tam O’Shantner, had a deep influence on Disney’s first animated feature film Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs.

-Bill 6/24