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| Wolfie's Florida State Archives |
By Jane Feehan
During the 1960s, before malls became popular high school hangouts
in Fort Lauderdale, Wolfie’s Restaurant on Sunrise Boulevard was the place to be seen. The deli was a
winner among all ages with its overflowing bowls of tiny breakfast Danish, mouth
puckering dill pickles and crunchy coleslaw, overstuffed
pastrami sandwiches and creamy New York cheesecake.
For those of us who spend a lot of time in Fort Lauderdale,
the restaurant’s demise is but one of many markers on the road of long
gone and forgotten … until someone who moved away while it was still open asks “whatever
happened to Wolfie’s?” A Publix now sits near that once-hallowed spot.
Wolfie’s history is complicated—except for its beginning. In
the beginning was Wilford or “Wolfie” Cohen. He got his start in the restaurant
biz working as a kid in the Catskills. He came to Miami Beach during the late 1930s and bought Al’s Sandwich
Shop at 23rd Street and Collins. He made it a popular place—one that
Al Jolson and Milton Berle visited. Customers seeking a glimpse of celebrities and
a good meal flocked to Cohen’s restaurant.
But Cohen set his sights on a larger empire. He sold his
place (with Wolfie's name rights) at four times what he paid for it to Meyer Yedlin in 1948. Wolfie opened another winner, Pumpernick’s, in
the 1940s and sold it in 1955, according to a Miami News obituary. When
Cohen died at 74 in 1986, he had also owned the Bull Pen, Mr. Mahzik, and the Rascal House (restaurant names should be unforgettable he once said). At the
time of his death, he owned only the *Rascal House, which he left to his
daughter actress Robin Sherwood. (Sherwood appeared in Brian de Palma’s Blow Out, in Death Wish II opposite Charles Bronson and in other films.)
Meyer Yedlin opened Wolfie’s in two Miami locations, at
Lincoln Road and Collins Avenue and another at 163rd Street in North
Miami Beach. He also opened one in St. Petersburg in 1953 (sold it in 1955) with partners and incorporated Fort Lauderdale Wolfie’s in 1958. Joseph Sloane, a partner in the St. Petersburg
venture, was also listed as owner of the Fort Lauderdale Wolfie’s. As I said, this ownership history gets complicated.
As tourism grew in South Florida so did the national
reputation of Wolfie’s, especially among New Yorkers. In 1961, a U.S. Appeals
Court ruled that the Wolfie’s name could not be used by a deli in Brooklyn;
only the two restaurants in Miami had rights. The Brooklyn partners claimed
they did not steal the name; “Wolfie” was a nickname earned by one of them for a reputation as a ladies’ man. The judge didn’t buy it. Yedlin (who died about 1960) or his relatives
had their hands in various Wolfie’s, thus the permitted use of the name at some other locations.
In 1968, during the Republican National Convention in Miami
Beach, Chef Craig Claiborne wrote in The
New York Times that Wolfie’s, open 24/7, was worth a visit but to conventioneers he recommended the breakfast spread at Pumpernick’s, by that time out of Wolfie Cohen’s hands.
Long after Wolfie’s closed in Fort Lauderdale—the
corporation involuntarily dissolved in 1984—it was announced that Wolfie’s Deli
Express was set to open a number of franchises in South Florida. I’m not sure
about the genesis of this corporation or whether it was even related to the
Wolfie’s we all knew and loved. In 1998, the president of the company claimed this was to be the “biggest
news” in franchising since McDonald’s. Anybody hear of it?
In 2002 Wolfie’s closed on 21st Street in Miami Beach. The last owner of the one on Lincoln Road was Samuel Kaye who died in 2012, but I'm not sure when that Wolfie's shut its doors; the same fate was dealt the restaurant on Sunrise Boulevard in Fort Lauderdale. International residents
and exotic palates have replaced the taste for Jewish borscht, bagels, lox and cheesecake but
not the fond memories woven into Fort Lauderdale and Miami history. And it all began with Wolfie Cohen ... Copyright 2015. Jane Feehan
St. Petersburg Times,
Dec. 18, 1953
Miami News, Sept.
21, 1958
The Reading Eagle,
Feb. 13, 1959
The New York Times,
Jan. 22, 1961
The New York Times,
June 10, 1961
Evening Independent,
Aug. 13, 1964
Miami News, Oct.
7, 1986
Schenectady Gazette,
Jul. 3, 1987
Boca Raton News,
June 3, 1998
Tags: Wolfie's, Wolfie Cohen, Fort Lauderdale restaurants in the 1960s, Miami Beach deli restaurants, Fort Lauderdale history,