West Stadium hang-outs

In the 50s and 60s, the top 2 places for Ann Arbor teenagers to hang out were Everett's Drive-In and the A&W on West Stadium Boulevard. Everett's was Ann Arbor's version of Arnold's from Happy Days. My favorite menu item was their double-decker California Burger. When Elias Brothers Big Boy restaurants began popping up in metro Detroit but hadn't yet opened a location in Ann Arbor, I began hearing rumors from friends who had been to Big Boy that a Big Boy Hamburger was a lot like a California Burger from Everett's.

When I got my driver's license in the summer of 1970 the first place I went to was Everett's. Me and my buddy pulled into a drive-in space in our '66 Dodge Dart convertible and enjoyed an open-air meal - by ourselves! By then the drive-in option had become less popular and most diners at Everett's went inside to eat. As you can see in the picture, a few years later they installed a drive-thru window as the car-hops were long gone.

It was a sad day when Everett's closed in 1980 to make way for a Taco Bell. One day that summer the Milkshake Gods took out their wrath on the demolition company when a major windstorm overturned their construction trailer, delaying but not stopping the inevitable.
A decade later, owner Everett Williams again made the California Burger available to Ann Arborites at Cafe Seven (see picture above).

As for A&W, when I was in grade school it was a special treat to go there at night when we would sit in the back window of the car and watch people jumping on trampolines at the Ann Arbor Gymkana which was located right behind the drive-in. Later we enjoyed going there to look at the cute car-hops, but the most popular waitress was a grandmother who worked there for years and gave such great service that she ended up getting a bigger tip than the young cuties
did.

In interviews Bob Seger has said that the Ann Arbor A&W was the inspiration for his hit song "Night Moves," and a plaque recognizing that fact now adorns the wall of the muffler shop that occupies the spot where the A&W once stood.

Besides being almost right across the street from one another, the two drive-ins also had another connection. After Everett's closed, the owner Everett Williams sold the rights to the California Burger recipe to A&W owner Jerry Smith, so you could still get a Cali burger in Ann Arbor until the West Stadium A&W closed in the 90s, and even after that at the Dexter A&W.