David Arena, a 35-year-old entrepreneur from Philadelphia, is planning to bring back the once popular Horn & Hardart Automats to the City of Brotherly Love, writes David Landsel for the New York Post.

The Automat has not been around for so long that many would not even recognize it. Meanwhile, older generations might feel a pang of nostalgia for the self-service restaurant chain that served lunches of pot pie and baked beans at affordable prices.

Arena is confident that he can resurrect the long-lost chain and believes that he can have the first location up and running in Philadelphia this year.

For Arena, this project is “his life’s calling.”

“We’re going back to the nostalgic 1920s, 1930s charm, to beaux arts, art deco, to the machines themselves — and we’re not going to modernize the recipes,” he said.

Horn & Hardart was originally founded by Joseph Horn and Frank Hardart in Philadelphia in 1888 as a luncheonette. The pair opened their first Automat in 1902. Customers got to serve themselves by getting prepared dishes from windowed lockers. The concept proved to be a hit for decades, but the chain had to finally close its doors for good in 1991.

Read more about Horn & Hardart Automats and its potential return to Philly in the New York Post.

_____