William “Bill” Elwell, the good and occasionally owner of a legendary hamburger tent in the San Fernando valley, died at age 98, causing a spill of admiration and memories of hamburger aficionados and restorers who were inspired by him.
Elwell, who founded Van Nuys Burger’s hamburgers in 1965 and worked there continuously for 60 years, died on July 21. Over the decades, he has become both draw and the hamburgers themselves.
Elwell has worked the risols of tempered and grilled meat on the original plate of his booth, which he believed had dated from the 1920s. Characterized as “Gruff“”spoofly“and”mummaryHe proudly ran the 10 -foot booth with rigorous rules (cash only, without substitutions), and could often be found to overthrow his customers.
“Is McDonald’s closed today?” He screamed regularly. “Why are everyone here? Go down the street!”
Another signature phrase is at the top and the bottom of the menu: “You can’t do it your way, that’s not Burger King.”
Allen Yelent, owner of the Local Goldburger Hamburger Chain and a client of a bill since childhood, said Elwell incorporated the best entrepreneurial spirit of the Valley.
“Bill’s, for me, represents what I love in small businesses and what makes small companies really beautiful in Los Angeles: the same person who cooks the hamburgers literally every day,” said Yelent. “Everyone can say they received a Bill hamburger.”
Elwell working at the barbecue at Bill’s Burgers in 2014.
(Barbara Davidson / Los Angeles Times)
Entering the other of penons, lighting stores and factories, the Elwell shack fed the valley industrial workers as promptly as food lovers who would visit Bill’s to Burger’s pilgrimage. Yelent, a native and resident of the San Fernando Valley, said that Elwell symbolized the “absolute worker mindset, ethics of the valley worker in which I grew up.”
William Clement Elwell was born in Ventura on November 23, 1926. He served in World War II and worked in a variety of negotiations, including a taxi driver and a linen company. He bought Van Nuys, costs $ 2,500 in 1965, before the block sidewalks were paved and only one dirt path took to the building.
Elwell and Bill’s hamburgers have seen numerous changes over the decades. At one point, the booth was called Bill & Hiroko, appointed to Elwell and his then partner, Hiroko Wilcox, whom he had known while playing bowling. She worked for Shack Burger with him alongside one of his five former wanders, Sharon Elwell. Bill Elwell told The Times in 2014 that one of his ex -Ex -it brushed, “We get along. It is he who cannot stand.”
According to an obituary Written by his family, published in the star of Ventura County, the hamburger icon leaves his son, James Elwell, and his daughter, Charlene Morris, along with eight grandchildren, 12 great -grandchildren, three great -grandchildren and various grandchildren and nephews.
On Tuesday morning, the first first day of business since Elwell’s passing news spread widely on social media, Henry McComas was the first client in line. The filmmaker moved around six years ago and visits the restaurant at least once a week, he said, often on his walks in the neighborhood.
A double cheeseburger at Bill’s Burgers in the photo in 2019.
(Mariah Tauger / Los Angeles Times)
“The first time I met Bill, he was very busy with the barbecue, and a professional and so focused that you didn’t know if I could talk to him,” said McComas. “He came to me and started a conversation, saying -as his hamburgers were great, but he took a raw hamburger and some of the flesh and ate in front of me and said, ‘That’s how good the meat is.’
“And I was addicted since.”
On Sunday, when McComas learned of Elwell’s death, he made a point of visiting Tuesday morning when the restaurant was opened, thanking the team for the continuation of the business. He wants Bill’s hamburgers to continue in the coming years.
“Bill’s legacy means a lot for the valley,” said McCormas. “It’s really a basic item. My hope is if the family wants to continue the business they do, because we will be here for their hamburgers.”
The legendary Burger Man occasionally threatened retirement or business selling, as He said to The Times He considered in 2020 during the pandemic. But Elwell said he hoped that even if he did, Bill’s hamburgers would continue without him. A team member told Times that he would like to continue the restaurant in honor of Elwell.
Yelent de Goldburger previously published an Instagram account dedicated to posting hamburgers he had liked. The first photo was from Bill’s. Dated from August 12, 2014, he captured: “Bill and Hiroko are inspirations.”
They remained an inspiration when Yelent cultivated their empire from a pop-up to several booths.
Elwell, then 93, receives a request from a client at his hamburger booth in 2020.
(Genaro Molina / Los Angeles Times)
“They worked super hard,” he said on the duo. “They touched their product every day. They were always completely and totally dedicated to what they were doing, and the city responded well. I want to have a small fraction of the legacy that Bill created in LA”
Yelent, who grew up in Chatsworth, found himself at Bill’s Burgers several times during his childhood, especially during his father’s stretch, operated a nearby TV workshop. In adulthood, he rediscovered him and thought Bill de Bill was even more inspiring than his first memories.
More recently, he found one of Elwell’s grandchildren working at the Burger Stand, receiving orders at the window while Elwell still tripled the barbecue.
Heavy hand owners Max Miller and Danny Gordon also grew up in the San Fernando valley and attended Bill’s hamburgers. When they started their own hamburger business, they turned to some of the restaurants that shaped not only their own tastes, but the region that created them. Bill’s, they said, represented “spots on the frozen valley” and “a taste of what San Fernando’s valley was” before being born.
“He was really one of the last to make food without excuses and meets the weapons when it comes to how he serves, how he manages his business and how he personally operates in space,” Miller said.
Miller, who attended high school in Van Nuys, used to compete for one of the coveted seat views.
A pair of customers leaves with their request from Bill hamburgers in 2020.
(Genaro Molina / Los Angeles Times)
Both tried to imitate Elwell’s “silent charisma show”, more often seen through him beating American cheese in the hamburgers, as casually, but accurately, throwing a playing card of their decks.
“For me, it’s a kind of western coast version of Di Fara Pizza in Brooklyn: the old man who goes at his own pace, not actually giving you time,” said Gordon. “He was just doing his things, and you’re there for this experience. It’s a type of restaurant that you don’t see many anymore. It’s definitely a boring to lose [Elwell]; He was a legend. ”
Like Yelent, Colin Fahrner also posted an Instagram Burger account before releasing his own restaurant, but he never posted a photo of Bill – he probably said, because his visit preceded the social media bill completely.
Fahrner said, the type of hamburger operation of the old school that inspired him to launch his restaurant, Yellow Paper Burger, although Bill’s perfectly stuck in blank.
“There are other places that do this, but I feel that he really clung to it for a long time,” he said about Elwell. “I think it’s also a reminder: all these legacy places are closing. Don’t wait to go to these points, because they can close any day or the owner can die, or whatever it happens … Now it’s time. These places will not be here forever.”
