The site of Montgomery’s renowned Elite Cafe (pronounced E-lite) at 121 Montgomery Street. It opened in 1910 and during its 1940s-‘50s heyday, it was known region wide. In that era, all the guests at the numerous masked balls would reassemble here after the dance was over and continue the revelry on into the night.
At right is a picture of the famous café as it appeared in the 1940s, bounded by Al Levy’s clothing store on its right, and by the derided Crystal Café on its left.
As a 24-year old bachelor and newcomer in 1951, I would sometimes eat lunch at the counter in the Elite lounge area, but more often I would go around the corner on Lee Street to its less-grand back-door companion eatery (shared kitchen), where I could get a gourmet lunch for 75-cents.
The Elite was noted for its steakes and seafood, and I recall a live lobster tank just inside the front entrance.
Elite Cafe Dining Room
-Charles Humphries
My mother worked as a hostess for Mr. Xides at the Elite in the late ’40s and/or early ’50s. I don’t know the exact dates. Her name at that time would have been Dorothy Hubbert, but she was called Dot.
– Chris Noftz
Some of the best memories of my childhood were spent in the Elite Cafe.
My Dad,Jack Hamel, and Ed Xides were very close friends.
They had been in WW11 together.
When the boys came home after the war and were going to school on the GI bill,Ed would take them down
to his Dad and feed them.
My Dad never forgot that and was always very loyal to Ed and the family.
I have such happy memories of Ed taking my sister and I back in the kitchen and feeding us while the adults had their “cocktails ”
I can taste that food till this day and I will always cherish those memories!
I have fond memories of eating at the Elite as a child with my parents in the 1960s and 1970s, then I was off to college and moved away and never went back, and that’s a shame. The lemon caper snapper was the best I’ve ever had and I loved the cocktail monkeys! Good times.
My mom worked as a hostess for Mr. Xides at the Elite in the ’50s. She thought the world of him.
I wish I had known about that back door companion to the Elite back when I lived in Montgomery many years ago! Unfortnately, I never ate there or at the main restaurant, but I knew of its reputation.
My family ate there in the early 60’s. Everyone was always so nice to us. I don’t remember exactly where it was.