Chuckwagon on Mackinac Island, Michigan Where the locals eat!
Bronco
     
Home
Menu
History
Contact
 

History

Zella Dubois and her husband, Ernest, were the original owners of the Chuckwagon Restaurant from the early 1950s until 1974. During her tenure she rented the building from Bob and Arlene Chambers.

Jessie Hart started working for Zella at the age of 18. A year or so before Zella retired, she started grooming Jessie to take over the restaurant. Jessie bought the restaurant from Zella 1974 when she was only 21 and renamed it Jessie's Chuckwagon. At the time coffee cost a dime and a piece of pie was $.35. Zella Dubois passed away in 1982 at the age of 76 in Iron Mountain, Michigan.

After 38 years of operating the Chuckwagon, Jessie sold it to Sharon Reurink in 2009, and Sharon changed the name back to The Chuckwagon. Read about Jessie leaving the Chuckwagon in the Mackinac Island Town Crier.

Sharon and Jessie had worked together at the Omelette Shop in Grand Rapids. Sharon and Donny Keith run the restaurant together, and their daughter Chantel also works with them. The building is now owned by Frank Nephew and Bob Benser. Read about their purchase of the Chuckwagon in the Mackinac Island Town Crier.

Located between the Main Street Inn and the Haunted Theatre, the Chuckwagon remains, after almost sixty years in business, a popular breakfast and lunch destination for locals and visitors. Its unique old-time diner atmosphere encourages social interaction among friends...current and future!

1964: The Sugar Shack on French Lane, where Zella DuBois, her daughter Kathy and the Chuckwagon waitresses lived.
Photo courtesy of Bonnie (Laurack) Salgat

Summer 1964
Zella DuBois & Bonnie Laurack
Photos courtesy of Bonnie (Laurack) Salgat

1968: Chuckwagon waitresses
Photo courtesy Kathy DuBois Wachter

Mike the waiter

Mike Craven and Jessie

 

Jessie cooking

Jessie cooking in the Chuckwagon
A full house on Jessie's last day!

Sharon and Jessie

Sharon and Jessie

Chuckwagon Patrons

Mackinac carriage passing the Chuckwagon

Chantel-Don

Don and Chantel

Sharon Reurink

 

PO Box 512
7400 Main Street
Mackinac Island, MI 49757
(906) 847-0019

chuckwagonmackinac@gmail.com 

VISA,  MasterCard & Discover

Facebook

Check out our reviews on:
Trip Advisor
Yelp