Roadside Diner Mystery Solved

On US Route 70 between Greensboro and Burlington, just east of the intersection with Rock Creek Dairy Road near Gibsonville, there's a little red train car on the side of the road. It's definitely seen better days, but looks sound enough to use as a storage shed. I've passed this structure a few times during my travels, and just had to know its story, and the part it played in the life of what was once a primary east-west automobile route. You can view it on google maps with street view. Coordinates: 36.064364,-79.611869

Thanks to Guilford County's online GIS, I pulled up the name and mailing address of the property's owner. The property record indicated that the rail car was built in 1929. I mailed the owner a letter inquiring as to the history of the rail car: was it a diner? When was it in operation? What was the name of it?

Weeks went by without a reply, and I'd almost forgotten I'd sent the letter. Today, I received the self-addressed, stamped envelope I had included, with a hand-written letter inside. The owner was most helpful in filling me in on the rail car's history. She said it was indeed a diner, called the Midway Diner, as it was about midway between Greensboro and Burlington. She and her husband acquired the property in 1956 and continued to operate the diner under the name Halfway Inn. They served basic roadside fare—sandwiches, soup, coffee, sodas, and such. The diner eventually closed around 1972 when it became too costly to keep the building up to code.

The Midway Diner. Think for a moment about the legions of motorists it served during its four decades in operation. Picture the tired traveler who, after jostling along US-70 (still NC-10 on his complimentary road map from the Shell station back in Durham) in his old Chevy headed from Raleigh to Greensboro, saw this beacon of civilization shining brightly in the roadside wilderness, and stopped to stretch his legs and recharge with a bowl of vegetable soup and a homemade grilled cheese sandwich. Perhaps after supper he dropped a dime on a cup of hot, fresh coffee and a slice of pie and hung around to catch FDR's fireside chat or get a few chuckles from Amos 'n' Andy on the Zenith. You don't get that kind of roadside experience much anymore. Nowadays you roll up to a Sheetz, chomp down a gristle burger slapped together by a flunky who speaks about 5 words of English, and fork over the cash to a glazed-over teenager who's so lost in thought over his next shroom party that he can barely get "thankyouhaveaniceday" out of his mouth. I do like their shakes, though.