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Lloyd's Different Cafe was a popular
diner located at 421 Mendocino Avenue on the Redwood
Highway in Santa Rosa. Lloyd's is now gone. It was located on the current site of the Press
Democrat, the area newspaper, in the heart of downtown Santa Rosa. Numerous artifacts in
this photo have also lost their battle with immortality. Grace Brothers Beer, represented on
the rounded fixture beneath the awning, Pabst Blue Ribbon Beer, represented on the sign on
the side of the fridge, and Rippled Wheat Cereal, which is in the three boxes on the shelf on
the upper right. All are now relics of American culture.
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Grace Brothers Brewing of Santa
Rosa, California, was in business from 1897-1920 and again after
Prohibition from 1933 to 1966. The brewery survived the 1906 earthquake that leveled much of
neighboring San Francisco. Their in-house horse-drawn fire-fighting equipment was used to help
put out the many fires that devastated the area. Grace Brothers opened again in the Spring of
1933 and in early 1936 began selling beer in cans, selling such brands as Nu Deal, GB, Cremo,
ExceH and Monogram, which today are tough cans for collectors to find. A mint condition example
of their Clipper Pale sold for $19,000 on Ebay in 2003, which was the most ever paid for a single can
of vintage beer at that time.
Rippled Wheat was from the Thousand
Windows Bakeries of the Loose-Wiles Biscuit Co of New York, NY.
Instruction on the package instructed consumers "to restore crispness, warm slightly before serving".
The slogan on the front of the box was "whole wheat... ready to eat". Boxer Jack Dempsey promoted
the product in 1936. It appears that this competitor to Shredded Wheat got shredded by Nabisco. Dates
for sales of Rippled Wheat are not available, but information appears to place it in the 1935 - 1940 timeframe.
 
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