The "Haydn Zug: Entrepreneur and Womanizer" Story

The corner of State and Main Streets in East Petersburg, PA.
This was home of Haydn Zug's Restaurant since 1925.

It was an ordinary day.  Standing near the corner of State and Main in the small town of East Petersburg, Pennsyl- vania taking a photo of Haydn Zug's Restaurant.  The restaurant is now for sale, but for years it was the most popular restaurant in East Petersburg.  Mr. Zug, the owner/operator of the restaurant which bore his name, first opened a general store and tavern/hotel in the same town in 1895.  In 1925 he moved the operation to the corner of State and Main and ran the place until his death in 1969.  In recent years business had diminished resulting in the building being offered for sale.  

The restaurant sign still hangs outside
the restaurant even though it no longer
operates as a eatery.

But, that certainly doesn't reflect on the quirky character who ran the business for years.  Haydn and wife Eva, who died in 1972, had two daughters who died in childhood and are buried in nearby Mennonite Church Cemetery near the site of their father's grave.  Now, I guess I should tell you that I just had to make a visit to the cemetery where Haydn and his daughters are buried to take a photograph of his tombstone which is somewhat different than any other in the graveyard.  While all the other stones are facing either east or west, Haydn Zug's monument stands catty-corner to all the rest, diagonally across two plots.  Haydn had this done by design to prevent his still living wife from being buried next to him for eternity.  His reason was: "She wouldn't sleep beside me while we were living.  She's not going to lay beside me when I'm dead."  Eva, who died three years later, is buried in Lancaster, PA's Greenwood Cemetery.  

Tombstone of Haydn Zug in Mennonite Church Cemetery,
East Petersburg, Pennsylvania.

Now there was a reason for Eva's behavior.  It all had to do with Haydn being a womanizer.  It was well-known in the little town of East Petersburg that Zug enjoyed the company of other women.  He would meet women in his bar and eventually drive them around in his Cadillac.  Not a good idea with a wife at home.  Haydn was an entrepreneur who not only ran his restaurant, but owned two farms, operated a miniature golf course and had the first drive-in movie theatre in Lancaster County.  A patron of his restaurant recalled seeing Haydn take the glass cover off the cheese display and pull out a knife, cut a slice and wipe the knife on his pants so to clean it for the next customer.   And now, in death, Haydn Zug lays diagonally in the straight rows of tombstones, keeping watch to make sure his wife doesn't sneak up on him.  It was another extraoridnary day in the life of an ordinary guy.