Longtime Customers Say Farewell To Scobee Diner

The mood was solemn at  Sunday evening as customers gathered one last time at the Little Neck eatery to say goodbye.

"It's hard to imagine life without Scobee's," said longtime patron Leah Ruda. "It doesn't seem real."

A survivor of recessions, a kitchen fire and the neighborhood's changing tastes, the air at Scobee Diner on its last day in business was thick with the memories of years gone by.

"I was Greg's first customer and I'm ready to become his last," said Ed Neidich, referring to Scobee co-owner Greg Christ.

Neidich said he sat down for his first meal at Scobee's in 1969 — a year that saw the summer of love, social unrest and perhaps most memorably for this Great Neck resident, the "Miracle Mets."

"My favorite Scobee memory is coming here when I was young, after high school," said Neidich, who ate his last Cheeseburger Deluxe Platter at Scobee's earlier that day. "We would sit here to all hours [talking] about sports and life and everything else."

For longtime Scobee patron Terri Barghan, the diner's final night provided a somber coda to a year filled with loss.

A customer since 1966, Barghan dined with her husband every Saturday evening at Scobee's until this April, when he passed away. Ever since, Ruda has helped keep the tradition alive, accompanying Barghan to Scobee's every week for dinner.

After their meal, Ruda and Barghan spent a few minutes thanking their waiters, all of whom they knew by name.

"Everything goes away eventually," Barghan said, her voice choking up slightly, seeming to conjure up vivid memories of loss, both past and present. "It's the way of the world."

At that, she clenched the hand of this reporter before walking toward Scobee Diner's glass doors for the last time.

"It is life," she said.