Daddy-O’s Cafe owner retiring months before turning 70
by Jim Boyle
Editor
Daddy-O’s Cafe in downtown Elk River is closing its doors on May 24.
Jeff Krueger, owner and operator of the popular establishment known for burgers, fries, tacos and malts, announced last week he is closing the business that dates back nearly 60 years, including the last 26 at 709 Main St.
“I want to thank the people of Elk River,” Krueger said Monday morning while prepping for the busy and emotional week ahead. “I’ll probably start crying now. The people have been amazing. They’re waiting outside to come in here. It has been overwhelming. Customers have been crying. Our employees are crying.”
Krueger is also thankful to his veteran serving staff who have stuck with him through thick and thin, including the pandemic, and he has been pleased with a young kitchen crew that has been amazing since coming on board.
“It has been nice to have people sticking by me and supporting me,” he said. “They know how hard I worked to keep the place open.”
Krueger, who bought the Elk River location in 1995 and moved his entire operation to the city in 1998, will turn 70 in January and decided it’s time to close this chapter of his life.
He’s going to try his hand at having a relaxing summer on his 10-acre hobby farm where has 10 classic cars to tinker with. His favorite is a 1938 Chevy Coupe, one that Don Fisher, the former owner of Don’s Bakery (Blue Egg Bakery now), painted for him.
Krueger figures by fall he will look for a job to keep from going stir crazy in the winter.
He’s spent more than five decades making a living at a restaurant, raising a family and leaning into his passions and hobbies.
“It’s not just a job,” he said. “It’s a way of life.”
Krueger grew up in North Minneapolis
Krueger grew up in North Minneapolis off of Penn Avenue and Broadway. He actually trained to be a baker at vocational high school run by the Minneapolis public school system. He had three hours of learning the trade each school day and three hours of classroom work. He graduated from there in 1973, and he even worked at a bakery after high school, but that job didn’t work out.
“I remember one year I had like seven jobs,” he recalled.
Then he applied at Taco Towne a few blocks from Brookdale Shopping Mall in Brooklyn Center and was offered a job. He turned it down, but thought better of it a few weeks later and called back. He not only took the job, but he would eventually take over the restaurant from the owner of the Mexican restaurant established in 1966.
He had struggled in school as a youngster with an undiagnosed learning disability. Having something of his own to run opened up his world.
Taco Towne sold a lot of tacos, of course. It also sold pizza, chicken and even some burgers, but under Krueger’s ownership the ratios changed and the restaurant outgrew its name. Krueger held a naming contest in 1983 and the winners came up with “Little Brooklyn,” according to a report in the Brooklyn Center Post.
The name of the establishment would be changed again in 1995 to Daddy-Os.
It was that same year that Krueger purchased the Elk River location, because he sensed his family was outgrowing that leased space at 63rd and Brooklyn Boulevard.
He worked with Pat Dwyer at the Bank of Elk River for a loan. His parents agreed to put their home up for collateral to make it possible.
“I didn’t even realize it at the time, but that was a big deal,” he said with a grateful tone.
Customers followed him to Elk River
With him and his family already living in Elk River, he closed the Brooklyn Center business down in 1998 and moved the whole package to Elk River. Many of his customers followed him, and the walls of the restaurant allowed him to pay homage to the simpler times he grew up in. Downtown Elk River, with its mom-and-pop shops reminded him of North Minneapolis back in the day.
“We moved the family out here 40 years ago,” he said. “I love Main Street. I love the old buildings. There’s so much history. I love this building. I love that it’s on the downtown mural (Walker grocery store). Daddy-Os is just a little part of the history.”
The restaurant oozes nostalgia from the reruns of old shows playing on a television, a juke box that does not play but still conjures up memories for people and a soda fountain that was once located in an Illinois airport in the 1940s.
As of this past Monday, there were still 17 flavors of ice cream available, but that is expected to dwindle. In an effort to keep up with the overwhelming demand, take-out orders are not being accepted. Krueger is apologetic about that and asks for people’s patience as people flock to the cafe for one last time.
Hung on the walls of Daddy-Os are photos, posters and other memorabilia, and there’s even an Elvis Presley. Krueger also has a shadow box hung on a wall with father’s dress blues military uniform and a couple Purple Hearts the Marines veteran received after he was shot in the Korean War.
There are a million other little stories, like the folded and encased American flag brought in by a veteran who served in Afghanistan and thought the walls of the restaurant were a good place for it to be showcased.
Other customers brought in license plates over the years, including one from the owner of a Bonneville who died of cancer.
“Lots of little stories,” Krueger said, noting his fervor for hanging on to the past while living in the present.
“When I first moved here we loved it,” Krueger said. “The population was like 4,500 people. I wish it would stay small. It’s progress, I guess. People call it progress.”
Business done the old-fashioned way
“I do things we did 50 years ago,” he said. “I run the business the way we did 50 years ago. I don’t have a cell phone. I don’t have a computer. That’s just the way I operate. You know, I don’t like contracts. I like to work on handshakes. I’m pretty much old school.
“I’m not the best businessman. I’m not the smartest man in the world, but I can do it through hard work and hustle.”
He learned hard work and hustle from his parents. His dad worked for Minnegasco, and his mom was a stay-at-home mom until their kids were raised. After that she was an accountant for North Memorial Hospital.
The restaurant has been a family affair. He and his wife were both involved until they divorced. Krueger’s twin boys worked with him while growing up — doing dishes, busing tables, and they even met their wives there. They had worked as waitresses at Daddy-Os Cafe.
“That was probably one of the best things, working with my boys,” Krueger said.
One of his three grandchildren has worked for him, too. The two younger ones won’t be able to.
May 24 will be the end of an era.
The building at 709 Main St. is for sale, awaiting its next chapter in the history of downtown Elk River.
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