The Four Way Soul Food Restaurant has been awarded a $40,000 “Backing Historic Small Restaurants” grant from American Express.
The award was announced April 27th on the Today Show.
According to its web site, American Express (NYSE: AXP), in partnership with the National Trust for Historic Preservation, is providing the “Backing Historic Small Restaurants” grant, which is “a more than $1 million investment to preserve historic restaurants in the U. S. as they continue to navigate the pandemic and plan for recovery.”
And, it says, “Through the grant program, small historic restaurant owners will have the opportunity to improve, upgrade, and preserve their physical spaces and online businesses, as well as mitigate existing operating costs. For example restaurants can rehabilitate the exteriors of historic buildings and facades, expand outdoor dining, upgrade their takeout and online ordering systems, or establish a stronger online presence. Updates like these are critical for future success in a post pandemic world.”
Four Way owner Patrice Bates Thompson, who appeared on the Today show, is part of the Bates lineage that has owned the restaurant at 998 Mississippi Boulevard since 2002. Her parents, the late Willie Earl Bates and the late Jo Ellen Bates, bought the restaurant, which originally was opened in 1946 by Clint and Irene Cleaves. Dr. Martin Luther King is among the many notables who have dined at The Four Way.
Thompson, who was interviewed in the Flyer, says she worked at The Four Way from the time her dad bought it. “I was office manager at Metropolitan Baptist Church,” she says in the article. “I could walk from my church in five minutes in the next block and work at The Four Way.”
And, according to the story, Bates did whatever she needed to do. “I’d work in the kitchen. I’d work the register. If I had to serve, I’d serve. To be honest, I still do that. Sometimes you’re short handed. You never know when your employees are going to come in and have a chip on their shoulder and not do what they’re supposed to do. I just fill in where I need to. You might come in next week and see me on the line.”
Thompson surprised when she heard on the Today Show that Four Way had won.
“I was extremely excited and I was actually shocked,” she says.
Thompson was interviewed a while back by the show, but not about the grant, which she had applied for. “They told us they wanted to talk to different restaurants and see how we were faring during the pandemic,” she says. And, she says, “I supposed it would be a discussion about how we made adjustments and changed the way we ran our business during the pandemic.”
And, she says, “I just didn’t make the connection. They did a great job keeping the secret.”
As for the $40,000, Thompson says, “The grant I applied for is in conjunction wth the National Trust for Historic Preservation and the whole initiative is to help legendary restaurants improve the outdoor look of there restaurant. Preserve the outdoors. Either outdoor dining or painting your building or, if need be, removing trash and things of that story.
“We’re considering outdoor dining. I’m not sure how to do it. We’ve had severe accidents on that corner. We don’t want anybody to risk their lives eating outdoors.
They might do landscaping and freshen up the green-and-tan building, she says. Thompson also would like to maybe add outdoor benches so customers will have a place to sit while waiting for their table.
