Typically a whistle stop is a brief pause by a train making its way along the tracks. This is not the case for the newest restaurant in Galion – visitors stopping by Millie’s Whistle Stop Café will want to stay a while.
Located at 241 Harding Way East in Galion, the café is open starting at 5 a.m. until 9 p.m. seven days a week. It was never the goal of owner Bob Johnston to own a restaurant, but he’s jumped into the industry headfirst.
“It wasn’t a lifetime dream or anything like that, it just kind of happened,” said Johnston. “When (Millie’s Diner) got closed down I bought this building and started rehabbing it and buying equipment, and before long I was in the restaurant business. It got to the point where I couldn’t back out, I had to keep going.”
Millie’s Whistle Stop Café formed as a reincarnation of the former Millie’s Diner, which had existed in Galion for more than 100 years. Johnston purchased the property at 241 Harding Way East to keep the diner alive, and seven months of hard work later the new café opened on July 15.
As the building inspector for Galion, Johnston had to jump through many more hoops than the average restaurant owner to open his doors. Since he couldn’t give permits to himself, Johnston had to go through Richland County for all inspections.
“Because I’m the building inspector, I had to have everything perfect,” he said.
After the space was ready to go, the next step was making Millie’s Whistle Stop Café a unique stop for customers in Galion. Johnston said he specifically tried to deviate from any other menu in town.
“We try to do a lot of things nobody else had in town, we want to be different than everybody else,” he said. “We didn’t want to be in competition with anybody, we wanted our own place here.”
The “Whistle Stop Café” part of the name comes from one of Johnston’s favorite movies, “Fried Green Tomatoes.” And true to its origins, Millie’s Whistle Stop Café has incorporated fried green tomatoes into the menu.
“That’s one of our big things here is fried green tomatoes, and of course the Millie’s part came from the diner,” said Johnston. The café’s “BL Fried Green T” sandwich features bacon, leaf lettuce, and a fried green tomato with Parmesan garlic mayo.
Also consistent with the restaurant’s name is the décor, featuring a number of railroad items from Johnston’s personal collection. His plan is to rotate the décor every six months with new railroad items from his own home.
“I have a railroad room at home, it’s not as big as this room but it’s a pretty good size,” said Johnston. “I didn’t hurt my collection any bringing this stuff in.”
The décor is not the only thing at Millie’s Whistle Stop Café that rotates. At the bottom of the menu is a note, “If there is something that you would like that is not on our menu, please ask. We will do our best to fill your order.”
“We’re asking for suggestions from everybody,” explained Johnston. “If you’ve got a suggestion – something you like, something you don’t like, something you think we should add to the menu – we’re taking notes.”
So far, Johnston has only heard positive feedback. Satisfied customers describing the meals offered used the word “awesome” more than once, and the restaurant’s opening on July 15 was overwhelming.
“We were smashed, we couldn’t keep up,” remembered Johnston. “We served 276 meals that day; we ran out of ingredients because we didn’t expect that.”
The grand opening of Millie’s Whistle Stop Café is Aug. 1, marked with a 10 a.m. ribbon cutting. Until then, Johnston has relied on word of mouth to spread the word about his new place.
“I’m so tickled about the response I’ve had from the public,” he said. “We’ve got a lot of great customers, and everybody has been coming back.”
