Gasper’s Restaurant off I-70 at Kingdom City, because of its coconut cream pie, was my favorite restaurant.

It closed in 2005.

In 1973, I was the director of the prevailing wage section in the Department of Labor and Industrial Relations. Missouri had few labor laws and when there was a complaint, they were sent to my office. At that time, there was no minimum wage for waitresses, and they were always complaining to me about their mode of payment.

One waitress from a restaurant in Kansas City called and said they were required to turn in their tips and this money was divided up and they were paid at the end of the week. That week the cash register was short, so they took her tips to make up the shortage.

There were three labor and industrial commissioners. One of the commissioners, Carl Brown, came to me and said he was going to get a bill passed to pay waitresses minimum wage since my office had so many complaints. He wanted me to find out what restaurant in Missouri had the most sales volume. In order to get the bill passed, he would have to exempt smaller mom and pop restaurants and just the restaurants doing a certain volume would be required to pay a minimum wage.

I had expected a steak house in Kansas City or St. Louis to have the most volume. But lo and behold, it was Gasper’s in Kingdom City. They were open 24/7, the first truck stop restaurant on I-70 and in 1973 they were doing almost a million and a half in volume. The commissioners and I were in shock. We had no idea a restaurant in Missouri could do this kind of volume. The owners blamed the demise of the restaurant on the fact that eating habits had changed from meat and potatoes to Mexican, pizza, and hamburger fast food chains.

I believe the closing of Gasper’s was because Lottie Gasper retired and quit making those delicious coconut cream pies. ——— Jack can be reached at PO Box 40, Oak Grove, MO 64075 or jackremembers@ aol.com