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While Diners were numerous in the northeast in the first quarter of this century, by the mid 1930s they were found along most major trucking routes, and in and around many of the larger east coast cities. Route 29 in the northern Virginia area had an impressive number of diners. In Fairfax County, by the early 1940s there were at least twenty businesses that used the word "diner" in their name, The 29 Diner was just one of many of this period that served a busy thoroughfare. Born in 1909,, Delmas T. ("Bill") Glascock came from humble beginnings in Loudoun County's Popular local legend has it that he left home with only eighteen cents in his pocket and the clothing on his back. With hard work and clever investment, and a Horatio Alger work ethic, he achieved the American dream. On 12 August 1941 he bought an acre lot on Lee Highway from William Hobart Beistel.14 Included on the lot was a popular restaurant business called the Blue Boar Inn. The Inn building, circa 1925, still stands about fifty yards east of the Tastee 29 Diner, and is now vacant. Beistel owned the Blue Boar, where at one point Glascock installed and operated slot machines. After purchasing the property, Glancock decided to construct the 29 Diner next to the older well-established restaurant, knowing full well that this was a highly visible site near an important intersection that led into town. During 1947, he made arrangements with the Mountain View Diner Company for the purchase and delivery of a diner to the present site, where foundations were prepared for the prefabricated structure. Mr. Glascock and his wife Elvira constructed the rear kitchen area with help from friends. The Tastee 29 Diner. was delivered to its foundation on 20 July, 1947. Originally known as the 29 Diner, Leonard Milliken, the current business owner, changed the name to Tastee 29 Diner in 1973. There have been numerous businesses in the 29 Diner since 1942, but the owner has always remained Delmas T. Glascock. Officially listed as a bondsman, Glascock has built other buildings and businesses next to the Diner, including Indian Trailer sales (the Airstreams shone in harmony with the diner), and a Texaco Station. Through the years the list of 29 Diner managers reads like a Who’s Who , of the metropolitan diner business. Oscar Lee Gray ran the 211 Diner in 1951 and moved to the 29 Diner in 1957, later showing enough success to run his Lee’s Diner just up the street from the 29 (10579 Lee Highway, now the site of the Golden Lion Restaurant, a frame building). Bob Parcelles ran a business in the 29 Diner in 1952: this was probably his first start as a managers. Parcelles later ran the Streamliner diner, which changed to Bob’s Diner in the late 1960s, and went out of business in 1985: the diner still exists, tucked into Mama's Restaurant at 9715 Lee Highway. When the diner business slowed in the 1970s, Parcelles added a large steakhouse addition to the side and in back of his diner to diversify his patronage, it was called Bob's Beef House. Bob’s Diner was a mid-1950s diner. It has little integrity remaining save for the salmon-pink Formica ceiling and a few idiosyncratic stainless-steel details peeking out over the grooved vertical panel board. By the time the City of Fairfax was incorporated in 1963, there were only four diners left within the city limits: Bob's Streamliner, the Royal Diner (formerly Lee’s), the 29 Diner and the Vincent Diner. The 29 Diner's closest competition, the Vincent Diner, formerly -located east of the Chain Bridge Road intersection an the south side of Route 29, was torn down in the late 1970s to make way for a Denny's Restaurant. Judging by photographs taken in the mid-1970s, the Vincent Diner dated to the 1940*. It had a rustic appearance created by a rough stone veneer that may have been a later addition.21 It did not approach the sophistication of 29 Diner’s stainless steel and glass brick streamlined appearance. Leonard Milliken has run the Tastes 29 Diner for eighteen years. The Tastes Diner chain, still popular in Maryland, was begun by the regionally famous diner-man Eddie Warner. In 1947, Warner ran the three original Tastes diners in Maryland; in Rockville (1932 moved from the silver Springs site), Bethesda (1938), Silver Springs (1946), with the Laurel (1950s) Tastes added to the chain much later. Milliken, part of a younger class of diner-men, was in partnership with the Gene Wilkes who currently runs all four Maryland Tastes Diners. Despite leaving the partnership, Milliken has retained the Tastee name and the Tastee menus at all five Tastee diners are still similar in logo style. At the Tastes 29 you can witness the evidence of the rough cut American entrepreneurial expertise that was natural for Delmas T. Glascock. Warner also personified this spirit as the diner-man who realized the American dream: No "big mouth," Eddie is sincerely wrapped up in the dining car business. He runs it, eats it, sleeps it and talks it. His sincere love for, and enjoyment of, his life's work is such that he should be called Mr. Diner instead of Mr. Warner. When you realize that the guy came up the hard way, from a $12.00 a week dishwasher to owner of four well-todo-diners, you've got to listen to him. While diners dwindled from around 6,700 in 1940 to 2,336 in 1986, there has been a resurgence of interest in the diner as a viable restaurant business. Some diners have been recycled to cater to higher epicurean tastes, serving meals that would have been foreign to the original clientele. While The Tastes 29 Diner's menu does not include *angels on horseback" (bacon wrapped 9 oysters on toast) or "boozy on a board" '(roast beef on toast)," it has rarely modified its meal offerings, and the standard fare has retained a patronage that is varied in class and walks of life. The presence of young northern Virginia professionals has not disturbed the old regulars, such as 73-year-old retired Fairfax County policeman, Frank Jones, who insists upon at least one meal a day served up by long-time waitress Betty west. Jones remembers that, as a young policeman, he watched the diner arrive on a flatbed truck around 7 P.M. one evening, to be promptly unloaded by 8 A.M. the next morning. He is just one of many who have found the Tastee 29 Diner to be a home away from home. Jenny Bryant now a manager at the Bethesda Tastes worked in the Tastee 29 for fourteen years and earned the nickname "Louisville Slugger" due to her occasional reliance on a "slugger," carefully placed behind the counter for graveyard shift rowdy problems. Also known as Mom, Bryant has been working in diners since the age of 13 when she started as a dishwasher in a Romney, West Virginia diner. Since the property has remained in the hands of a single owner, Bill. Glascock, who has maintained the building in a conservative fashion since 1947, the building is virtually unchanged. Glascock was even against the name addition of Tastee. This information was prepared January 30, 1992 by
July 1999 Updates to the above information 1973 Leonard Milliken of Warrenton and his business partners bought the diner, changing the name from the "29 Diner" to "Tastee Diner" to coincide with the name of the partners Tastee Diners in Bethesda and Laurel Maryland. Sometime around 1986 the partners separated with Milliken taking the 29 Diner in 199? the name "Tastee" been removed from the name, its now back the the original name "29 Diner" Building and land Owner Bill. Glascock pasted-away in 1999 Ginger Guevara who started as a waitress in 1966 and her husband Fredy now own the 29 Diner.
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