Arlington has never had a shortage of unique local eateries and for many, one of the most memorable was the Tops Drive Inn on Lee Highway.
Home of the "Sir Loiner," a double-decker hamburger thought by many to be a forerunner of today's Big Mac, Tops was founded by businessman James J. Matthews in 1953.
The original Tops Drive Inn was a 15-seat facility which included a team of carhops and a machine called the Teletray, enabling drivers to order their food without getting out of the car. The interior featured turquoise-colored phones at the tables for placing your order, and mini-juke boxes for hearing the hits of the day. There were 18 Tops in the DC Metro area before Matthews merged the chain into Gino's Inc. in 1968.
Some Tops trivia:
- Three of the sandwiches served at Tops were the Sir Loiner, the Jim Dandy, and the Maverick.
- Tops was the original server of Col. Sanders' Kentucky Fried Chicken in the area, and owner James J. Matthews served on the board of Kentucky Fried Chicken Corporation after Colonel Sanders retired.
- There was once a 15 minute television afternoon weather show sponsored by Tops called "Top Of De Vedder." The program was hosted by "Professor Felix Von Topsnak," who used a hand-drawn map of the U.S. on which he'd chart the weather while dressed in an overcoat, top hat and monocle.
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We alternated among the Lee Highway Tops [at the corner of George Mason Drive, now a bank, but the Tops Cleaners next door remains], the Glebe Road Tops [at the NW corner with Arlington Blvd], and the rival Hot Shoppe on Lee Highway at Kirkwood Road. A friend worked at Tops one summer and claimed to know the ingredients in the "Secret Sauce". Everyone listened to WEAM, and we would call in dedications to each other – 'to Chris and Sue at Lee Highway Tops from Pat and Brian at Hot Shoppes',, etc. Susan Clay [suec@fox-run.net]
So what did he say was in the secret sauce?
No matter what you ordered, when the tray came it had a salt and pepper shaker on it. It never had a salt and pepper shaker on it when it went back inside, and everyone's mother was infuriated about the hundreds of shakers in the kid's bedrooms.
I’ve still got a Tops salt shaker. Anyone have the recipe for the Sirloiner “secret sauce”?
spent my teen years hanging out at falls church tops. Met so many good people there, all were into cars. I thought the world would end when Tops closed.
Hey Mark, Jeff Freeman told me to Google Tops, I sure didn’t think I would see a familiar name. How are you doing. We live in the Shenandoah Valley. 8 miles from Winchester in Stephens City. We can’ forget all the good times at Tops either. You are so right about the good people there.
We would always go to the Lee Hwy.location. Tops always had an off duty Arlington officer working there on weekends for security. My uncle had brought me back a set of tripple air horns from Italy to put on my car. The horns could be blown individually or in unison.When I installed them in the car I hid the switches.Every weekend we would go in and start with the blowing of the horns.The officer would come out and look everywhere, get upset and then give up.He never did find out who it was (until now) sounds juvenile now but was “entertaining” at the time. A great place for innocent fun and good food.
Exactly the same as Susan Clay . . .amazing