Archie Parrish opened Archie’s Lobster House at 7130 Williamson Road in 1947.
It quickly became THE place for seafood in the Valley. It remained that way until it closed in 1978. The building was finally torn down in 1981.
Archie’s was popular with Roanokers for decades. Its menu carried all kinds of seafood and other things like steaks. Obviously, lobster was a big thing at Archie’s.
In October of 1960, Archie’s had a little event where it served what it said was its one millionth lobster. That is a staggering number. To reach that number since its opening in 1947, it would have had to average almost 200 lobsters a day.
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Roanoke Times & World News Staff Writer Joe Kennedy wrote a review of the Lobster House for the paper in March of 1977.
Straightforward Cooking Found at Lobster House
Roanoke Times & World News, Saturday, March 26, 1977
By Joe Kennedy
Staff Writer
It seems inconceivable that anyone who has lived in Roanoke for any length of time would not have heard of Archie’s Lobster House on Williamson Road.
Since I947, Archie Parrish has served up seafood including fresh Maine lobsters, and generally retained
his reputation as master of what may be Roanoke’s best-known restaurant.
Certainly Archie’s is famous among oldtimers. A glance at the framed photographs of Archie with
Louis Armstrong. Archie with Lionel Hampton, Archie with a vintage Miss America and framed newspaper articles shows just what a hot spot the restaurant (formerly a supper club) used to be.
The cover of the menu says the restaurant served its 1,000,000th lobster in 1960; and the lobster tank still stands near the door. and holds several live crustaceans.
No fewer than eight lobster dishes are listed on the menu, including imported lobster tail for $3 95 and up, lobster newburg at $8.50, au gratin at $8.50, thermidor at $8.95, and lobster dainties at $6 95.
Fortunately for those on shoestring budgets, the menu includes other items as well, such as numerous steak dishes, shrimp, chicken, ham, and seafood platters.
My wife and I go to Annie’s on weeknights from time to time because (THIS LINE IS MISSING.) the restaurant uncrowded, the seafood prepared in a straightforward way.
Curiously, we never ordered lobster, but I don’t know why.
Last Monday, we arrived around 7:30pm and found perhaps 20 other customers distributed at tables and booths throughout the large, softly lit dining room.
We were led to the booth adjacent to the bar, which is not the best seat in the house but is the one we’ve been led to on other, uncrowded occasions, for reasons best known to those who do the leading.
A lengthy period of time-at least 10 minutes-passed before our waitress arrived to take our order, but she served us cordially and attentively throughout our meal.
With funds limited as usual, we declined cocktails and chose out entrees. My wife settled on steamed
Shrimp, french fries and tossed salad in lieu of sliced tomatoes, which were unavailable.
I ordered creamy clam chowder, tossed salad, baked potato and trout stuffed with crabmeat and shrimp dressing.
The food came along quickly enough, and again it proved to be straightforward and satisfying, with
qualifications.
The clam chowder was tasty, but the salads seemed a bit drab minus sliced tomatoes.
My wife‘s steamed shrimp, a goodly number served in their shells. delighted her Virginia palate, but to me, who was reared in Maryland, they seemed mild.
Nevertheless, they were better than those I’ve tasted elsewhere in these parts, where “steamed” and
“boiled” apparently are thought by some to be synonymous.
Her french fries were unremarkable, but my baked potato was just right, served with several scoops of
sour cream.
The price of her meal was $5.95.
I had ordered stuffed trout both to escape my soft crab habit and to break the boredom of what had been an unspectacular day.
I succeeded on both scores, for the dish was delicious. It consisted of a good-sized fish, its head sliced and pulled away from, but not off, the carcass, surrounded by the usual trimmings.
The meat was flaky and warm, and it swam above the baby shrimp and crabmeat dressing. Barely a bone could be found.
Perhaps the best thing about the trout was that despite the trimmings, it still tasted like fish. At some restaurants. the garnishes, sauces and other special effects are so sophisticated as almost to obliterate the seafood, which may be fine with some people but is distracting to me.
My straightforward fish dish cost $6.45.
We declined desserts. When the 25 cents for iced tea and 35 cents for milk were added in, the bill came to just over $14, before the tip.
The meal had taken just over an hour, and it left us feeling as if our time and money had been put to good use.
Archie’s Lobster House had a long run in the Roanoke Valley, until ill health forced owner Archie Parrish to close the restaurant. The Roanoke Times covered the closing in an article on May 20, 1978.
Archie’s Restaurant in Roanoke County Closes
By GEORGE KEGLEY Business Editor
Archie’s Lobster House, the most widely known restaurant in the Roanoke Valley 25 or 30 years ago, has closed.
Archie’s Tavern, its predecessor, was opened by Archie Parrish with a $300 bankroll in 1947. The Lobster House was the first seafood restaurant in this area.
Parrish’s ill health was given as the reason for the closing of the Williamson Road restaurant. He said Friday that he has no plans to reopen the restaurant at the present.
Parrish, a Richmond native who started as a Peoples Drug Store pharmacist, has operated at least a half-dozen restaurants.
He was president of the Virginia Restaurant Association in 1955 and twice won the Sidney J. Weilman Award for constructive efforts to advance the restaurant industry.
In 1961, Parrish was recognized as a member of the Hall of Fame of American Restaurant Magazine. He received a plaque from then-Gov. J. Lindsay Almond Jr. He was the 150th restaurateur honored among 220.000 operators in 11 years.
For a time, Parrish. operated a House of Beef restaurant at the Orange Avenue Holiday Inn, Mr.Mity Drive-In in Salem, Archie’s Town House on Franklin Road, and a supper club at Dixie Caverns, as well as restaurants in Harrisonburg, Lynchburg and Baltimore.
A trademark of his lobster house was a “doggie bag.” for customers to take scraps home to their pets.
Parrish lost his voice after a series of cancer operations took his vocal chords in the late 1940s but he learned to talk again.
He learned the food business while working in a post exchange during World War II Army service.
He came to Roanoke soon the war.
Archie Parrish died on September 7, 1978 at the age of 74.
Bulldozers razed the old Lobster House on November 16, 1981. This is how the Roanoke Times covered the end of an era.
