Forever Young's: Eatery is 60-year hub

The mom-and-pop diner has been in the heart of Ellsworth for six decades.
& lt;a href=mailto:bjackson@vindy.com & gt;By BOB JACKSON & lt;/a & gt;
VINDICATOR STAFF WRITER
ELLSWORTH -- When Myron Young got out of the Army in 1946, he thought about going back to his old job as a truck driver for General Mills.
"But I got distracted and ended up here," he said, chuckling. "I've been here ever since."
"Here" is Young's Restaurant, a tiny mom-and-pop diner on the northwest corner of U.S. Route 224 and state Route 45 in the center of Ellsworth Township. The distraction was a young lady named Carrie Elaine McJunkin, whom Young married in 1947.
Myron and Carrie started out working together at the restaurant, which Carrie's parents originally owned, then they took over running it in the 1960s.
"This is a gathering place for a whole lot of people," the 77-year-old Young said as he slid his coffee mug across the table to be refilled by his daughter Susan Young.
Myron is proud of the fact that even though nearly six decades have passed, time has almost stood still inside the diner, which has room to seat exactly 33 people.
Old-fashioned feel
Shelves behind the counter are lined with old pop and milk bottles, and the walls are decorated with old photographs, including an aerial picture of the restaurant taken in 1954.
The gasoline pumps that once were in front of the restaurant were removed in the 1980s. But if you're in the market for a Timex watch or a set of wrenches -- standard or metric -- you can get them at Young's.
"We don't sell as much of that kind of stuff as we used to," said Myron, who enjoys buying such items at flea markets and selling them at his counter. "We stay pretty busy with just selling food."
There is a tiny, cluttered office behind the counter, over which hangs a sign that says, "Mayor's office."
"It's a self-proclaimed title," Young said with amusement. "No one has ever run against me."
Ellsworth is unincorporated so it doesn't have a mayor. Young said some of the restaurant customers had the sign made for him years ago at the Canfield Fair.
For years, the eatery was known for its homemade pies, which Carrie made daily. Apple was her specialty, although ground-cherry was also popular.
"People came from miles around for those pies," he said.
Permanent fixture
Arthritis has kept Carrie, 75, from baking pies or working at the restaurant for about the past 10 years. But Myron still shows up every day, greeting customers and holding court over the business he's grown to love.
"I'd be lost without this place and these people," he said. "I keep telling people I might retire when I'm 93. But probably not."
The restaurant opens at 4:30 a.m., early enough to accommodate people on their way to work the early shift at the General Motors plant in Lordstown.
The front door swings open almost constantly as customers amble in, get a warm greeting from Myron, Susan or one of the other family members who work there, and settle in for heaping helpings of food and atmosphere.
Paul Acker of Berlin Center and Bill Murphy of Beloit have been coming to Young's for years. They stop in about three days a week to sip coffee and talk about miniature horses, which both of them raise.
"We're filled up after we leave," Murphy said, stabbing his fork into a pile of crispy hash brown potatoes.
"And it's friendly here," Acker added. "That's why we come back."
Clientele has changed
In its earlier years, the restaurant got much of its business from truck drivers who were on their way from Cleveland to Pittsburgh, Chicago or Detroit, Young said.
But when the Ohio Turnpike opened years ago, it took away the truck traffic and many of the out-of-state drivers who were simply passing through and needed a place to stop for a meal.
"We thought that was going to hurt us," Young said, a wide smile crossing his face. "But these local people just kept coming in. They've kept us going."
Every now and then, celebrities have been known to stop by. Young said country music singers who were in the area to perform at Ponderosa Park, located just a few miles south on Route 45, would pull up in their tour buses and come inside -- although he couldn't specifically recall their names.
The one big-name performer he does remember, though, is George Wagner, a professional wrestler who performed in the 1950s under the name of Gorgeous George.
"He was in town once to wrestle in Struthers and he ended up here," said Young. "He liked it so much that he came back again the next time he was in town."
Young said the locals would always be abuzz when one of those high-profile customers would come in, but "they always pretty much left them alone."