When the Hungries Hit...

Whenever I display prints of this painting (the original is long sold), inevitably it gets a big response from people of a certain 'vintage'...that is to say, MY vintage.
It's a scene of an old Red Barn restaurant, one of a chain that started in the midwest United States in 1961 and eventually grew to 400 outlets in the U.S., Canada, and as far away as Australia.
The particular Red Barn that my family would frequent was located on Merivale road in Ottawa.  The entire family (all eight of us) would load up in the family's Country Squire station wagon to make the trek.  That's why I've included the faux-wood-adorned back end of one of these cars in the painting.
Arrival at the Barn meant having to choose which of the three "Hungries" would be best suited to satisfy your fast food cravings.  I can't remember which would typically be my choice, but I can probably guarantee it wasn't the fish one.
What WAS very memorable was the little cardboard barn your meal came in.  That, and the sheer fun of being a child on a summer's night in the late 1960s, partaking in a favorite family ritual.
The Red Barn ultimately was a short-lived thing, soon to succumb to another American fast-food chain...this little restaurant called "McDonald's", that would also take up residence on Merivale road and ultimately cause the shuttering of the Red Barn's doors forever.
Many of the buildings themselves were repurposed, and that distinctive roof line can still be spotted now and again.  But the Red Barn itself lives on only in photos and paintings, and also in the memories a particular group of people, of a particular age, who never fail to stop in their tracks when they see this painting at my booth.