Longtime St. Charles hangout sees major renovations

As a new reporter in St. Charles in 1977, it was fun when my boss took me to the Tin Cup Pass restaurant on the east side of St. Charles as part of my introduction to the area.

I never questioned how or why a St. Charles restaurant and retail strip would carry the same name as a relatively short trail through parts of Colorado. It was a free meal, and who doesn't like that?

My boss said it was a new place in town getting some buzz among local residents because its theme made it different from other restaurants. So, I went along with that and just enjoyed the western motif and the cheeseburger the waiter served.

The St. Charles mayor at that time, Fred Norris, confirms still today that the place had some drawing power.

“It was certainly exciting when it opened,” Norris said. “It was one of the first themed restaurants and it had two levels inside, which was different.”

Even though Pheasant Run actually introduced a “theme” setting in St. Charles years earlier with its New Orleans street motif, the Tin Cup Pass restaurant was “very popular” for about five or six years with its western look and feel, Norris added.

It was the key business in the Tin Cup Pass retail strip, along the 1500 block of East Main Street. The look of the retail strip had pretty much passed the test of time, without a lot of changes to its aesthetics in 40-plus years. Until now.

New owners applied for an exterior remodeling permit for the shopping center, and their permit drawings include a new name, said Rita Tungare, director of community and economic development in St. Charles.

Even though the Tin Cup Pass name still sits on the sign facing Main Street at the retail strip, the permit drawing has “Stone Creek (formerly Tin Cup Pass)” written on it, Tungare said.

Work is well underway to create Stone Creek, and possibly leave Tin Cup Pass to the history books. Most of that work seems to be focused on the building at the east end of the strip that once housed the Tin Cup Pass restaurant and, more recently, for nearly 30 years actually, the Gino's East restaurant.

But other buildings are getting a makeover as well. Customers have to avoid construction barriers, but they still patronize the businesses there, as Dunkin' Donuts and Arby's has its regular flow of customers.

When the work is done, longtime retail strips on each side of town will have entirely different looks. However, unlike the Valley Shopping Center on West Main that was demolished to make way for the new police station, the former Tin Cup Pass will remain a retail location.

River and ‘Fox' reminder:

Don't forget that volunteers to help clean up the Fox River are meeting between 8:15 and 8:45 a.m. Saturday, Sept. 21, at Ferson Creek Park, along Route 31 on the north side of St. Charles.

Those who want to walk up that morning to register are welcome to help the organizations hosting this event.

For a little inspiration, it's probably a good time to pass along information that reader Barb Gacic asked me to share.

“Many Fox Valley residents are either too young or haven't been in the area long enough to remember how unhealthy the Fox River was in the 1970s,” she said.

“A wonderful gentleman with the moniker of ‘The Fox' led night raids to expose the companies that were polluting the river.”

Gacic said she understands how “time has moved on,” but she felt it was a good idea to remember how a concerned citizen “took on the fight for a clean river.” That fellow was James Phillips, who used the alter ego “The Fox” to expose pollution along the river, but he was also engaged in letting everyone know that Lake Michigan was also a target of some major companies.

No one knew who “The Fox” was until years later, when Phillips engaged in newspaper interviews to tell his story. He penned a book under the assumed name of Ray Fox titled “Raising Kane,” about his work as “The Fox.”

His mission, as it was, started in the late 1960s and he was credited with getting others involved in environmental causes in the 1980s.

He grew up on a family farm in Montgomery, and he worked as a field inspector for the Kane County Environmental Department from the late 1970s to 1986. He died in October of 2001 at age 70.

Thompson's makeover:

Plenty of longtime residents had fond memories of Reid Field on the west side of St. Charles, as it was the home to the Fighting Saints of St. Charles High School for so many years.

When the field got torn out a couple of years ago, it was another example of time moving on and leaving the past behind.

But time moved forward nicely on this occasion because the new artificial turf football/soccer field and track is a tremendous addition to the new Thompson Middle School complex.

When recently walking around the project, I told my wife it was like visiting a school at a different state. After all, we were familiar with just about every part of the building and the grounds.

My wife spent a major chunk of her life near Thompson, which was the old high school years ago, and we lived nearby for a couple of years in the mid 1980s after getting married.

Any major makeover of a school has its share of supporters and detractors, depending on what it cost and how students are shifted around. But if we're judging on aesthetics and campus setup alone, Thompson is scoring some big points.

Putt of a lifetime:

You may or may not have missed my columns last weekend when I gave my writing a rest. I was out of town for the most part, playing golf at Geneva National in Lake Geneva for a couple of rounds and doing other fun stuff.

It was well worth it from this standpoint: After 40-plus years of playing golf, I sank what, for me and likely many others, would be the putt of a lifetime.

It was a 45-foot downhill bender, and you had to be there to realize how crazy it was. The fact that it saved me a par on a par-5 hole doesn't matter. It could have been for a triple-bogey and I'd still be talking about it for weeks on end.

Gen Hoe's honor:

In taking last weekend off, I found a leftover from my Festival of the Vine notebook: Gen Hoe restaurant earned the Lencioni Best Presentation Award at this year's Flavor Fare at the annual Geneva festival.

I can't say for sure what that means, other than the restaurant set up a nice table for visitors to get their fill of Chinese food during the festival.

And that's the key with the Gen Hoe table each year — they give you a lot of food, and it's really good.

Gen Hoe has been operating out of 537 E. State St. in Geneva for 50 years.

dheun@sbcglobal.net