Hey Hokies! The Homeplace Restaurant in Catawba is reopening under new family ownership this spring! They plan to keep it similar to the Homeplace we knew and loved. pic.twitter.com/BZj0wtRyBk— Tina (@tinainvirginia) January 22, 2026
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Sub Station II and Homeplace back in the same year? Maybe this 2026 is the new 2016 trend is for real.
aside from our football being decent in 2016 I remember 2016 being a not very good year so....no thanks?
Basketball made the NCAA tournament and Wrestling was also great that year. Solid all around for Hokies Sports.
I got engaged earlier in the day of the acc chanpionship game
Sub Station 2 is back??? How did I miss this! This news is better than the Franklin hiring
I am happy it's back, but they really missed an opportunity by not calling it Sub Station IV, so we could all try to figure out what happened to III.
Haha thank you for the chuckle, have your leg
Yes!!!!
This is the best news I've heard in a while. I have many good memories from being at the Homeplace: Being there and running around as a kid in the freezing cold waiting for our name to be called, graduation party from high school there, and my then gf and now wife met my parents for the first time there.
Best news of the year so far
Hiking downhill from McAfee Knob, knowing that The Homeplace is open again.
My parents moved to Catawba off of Blacksburg Rd 6 years ago. I've made a little sad face every time I pass the location on my way to visit. I was so hyped when my parents shared that they changed ownership (supposedly the previous owners were burned out and younger generation didn't want to take it on). Glad to see it's officially opening!
Hey, our parents are neighbors!!
/s not really cuz blacksburg rd/catawba rd is long af but minor details :P
They might have run into each other, especially if your parents enjoy a beer! Mine are owners and operators or a certain sun themed farm brewery.
Then I have certainly met your parents.
If I put the pieces together correctly then I'm pretty sure they mentioned it. They were thrilled to have you come through!
Yes, we know each other from clubs and festivals and the work at breweries.
Aaaahhh yes we know OF them but we arent a big beer drinking family so full confession we've never been
No worries at all. I've learned the valley is pretty connected so I figured dropping a not so subtle hint would be enough!
When we lived in Roanoke we would hit this place about once a month. Nothing better than hearing the surly guy over the intercom "O'Neill, table for 5 with a HIGH CHAIR"
Oh man i went with my buddy w last name Brooks a couple times and that intercom man somehow stretched it to three syllables
Somehow I imagine this sounding like the singing frog in the old Looney Tunes cartoon 'One Froggy Evening' when after siging up a storm the curtain would go up and the frog would be on the stage floor and have that long drawn out 'brrrrr-rrrrr-up' sound...
That was an awesome cartoon and I've seen it several times over the decades. The frog would tap dance with a top hat and cane while singing "I'm just wild about Harry". I always felt so sorry for his person who dreamed of riches and fame but ended up with a frog that only sang to him. Thanks for the memory.
EDIT: I got the song all wrong, as is pointed out in the next post. Shows what age and time can dull the memories, but I can still see that frog singing and dancing and the poor old man's disappointment. I was trying hard to figure why the frog was singing about Harry anyway, but I won't go there.
"Hello my baby, hello my darlin', hello my ragtime gaaaa-aaaal!"
Love that cartoon!
Yeah, thanks for the correction. I was unsure of myself, but it has been decades since I saw it. Will edit my post.
The frog sings both songs mentioned as well as "Come back to Erin" and "Michigan Rag", and "Won't you come over to my house" and "Figaro" and "Please don't talk about me when I'm gone" and Wild about Harry" and Throw him down, McCloskey", Below is a montage of the songs from the original a WB kids 'sequel' to it. FYI the frog is named Michigan J Frog"!
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God I love the internet. Thanks for this!
Wasn't trying to correct you, buddy, just that's what pops in my head when I think about it.
Oh, not to worry, Little Bobby, I didn't take it that way, and as you see, I wasn't exactly wrong either. What you did do was bring it back to mind and then I remembered a lot more as I watched the 'toon again.
As far as that stuff goes, I appreciate corrections especially when I post something that might need some "help", something that seems to happen more and more often as I age and the memory gets crowded. I'm at the point where for the first time in my life, I can re-read one of the many hundreds of books I enjoyed and not remember enough to make it boring. If I read it more than 3 years ago, it's like it's almost the first time. I guess that's not a bad thing, all told. I have my second knee surgery coming up next week and I am going to start at A and read all of Sue Grafton's Kinsey Milhone series as I recover. Read them all a couple of times through the years, but looking forward to easy reading in a genre I enjoy that won't make me think too much for the pain meds to interfere in.
But, as is so often the case with the aged, I do digress.
Fun fact about the song Hello Ma Baby, it is actually about the at the time new phenomenon of having a phone and saying, "Hello" to someone when they called.
Which I now type to you from my...phone
We are SO BACK
Now let's bring back Mike's, Pokey's and Boudreaux's!
Ooo Mike's top tier burgers and pizza. That hurts my soul thinking about it being gone. My buddy and I would go bowling at Squires for awhile and then head to Mike's and split a cheeseburger and pizza. Leftovers for lunch. Good times!!
The Maroon Door in the old Mike's spot is worth a visit if you're in town. Very good food, Local beers. Good TVs. Give them a decade and they will have built some of the Mikes nostalgia with the current students.
Nice, the last two times I've come up, most of Blacksburg was closed due to Winter Break, but I'll be checking them out next time I'm up for a basketball game.
The smoked rabbit eggrolls are a must order whenever we go.
If it is just like it was before, this is worth a 7 or 8 hour drive to visit again.
Everybody on this page deserves legs. Great news.
Even if I will never go there again, this is heart warming news. I have such fond memories of the hungover journey to Homeplace, and then feeling terrible again after all of the glorious overeating.
Wasn't the thing when I was there. It was the Farmhouse for parent visits or a date or the Hokie House with the buds, basically. Mike's pissed us off for closing in the summer when the students were gone and we owned the town for a while, so we kinda quit going there. When I was a rat, the upperclassmen all loved the Golden Gobbler, but I was too young and sans vehicle for that place. I honestly don't think I ever went to the Homeplace. As a student on the GI Bill, I was way too poor to afford that or anything other than cheap.
Definitely been to the Farmhouse with my family back in the early/mid 80s for dinner on their infrequent visits...
I have a question for the mature among us who were at Tech in the late 1970's or early 1980's. The discussion on the Homeplace stirred a latent memory. Maybe my memory is jumbled, but I seem to remember a restaurant that was thought of as a fancier establishment that was in an old farmhouse, similar to the Homeplace (never been there, wasn't aware of it when I was in school). I seem to remember this place being located somewhere on 460, on the west side of the road, between Christiansburg and Tech. I want to say it was between the old Southgate Road campus entrance intersection w/460 and Prices Fork Road, maybe opposite of Smithfield. I remember this place being off the road a bit, but still visible from the road. I could never have afforded this place when I was in school, but as I recall, it was known for its steaks. Have my memory banks had a few 1's and 0's moved around and corrupted the data? Does anyone have a clue about what I'm remembering (or mis-remembering, as the case may be)?
I believe you're talking about the Farmhouse?
That was my take. And now I am wondering how the HomePlace compared to the Farmhouse. Anyone...? Anyone...?
To put it succinctly, you're comparing apples and oranges. The Farmhouse is an upscale restaurant (just looked at a menu, $7 sides!), and the Homeplace was a family-style restaurant, in that you get large plates/bowls of ham/fried chicken and sides, from which you serve yourself. Each excellent in their own way.
Thank you for that and for being succinct and not terse.
A good use of brevity.
This comment was superfluous. /s
Insufferable sesquipedalians
Yep, like I mentioned above.
Thank you! This must be what I had in mind, but was thinking it was closer to campus. Looking at the location, the surrounding area must not have been as developed when I was in school. Maybe I'm wrong, but I remember it being in the middle of nothing.
When I was a student in the early 70s, the Farmhouse was 'the place' and it was surrounded by nothing but farmland. Definitely not so much these days. There has to be hundreds of homes on the former farmland.
Yeah the stretch of 460 from Christiansburg to Blacksburg was SO sparse and different back in the 80s; nothing of consequence except the Corning Glass plant near Peppers Ferry. No shopping centers/housing developments etc anywhere near there.
Then again the back of Terrace View at Hunt Club and Progress was the extent of that part of town then- and now there's a crap-ton of new housing/apartments back that way ....and Patrick Henry Rd stopped at Tom's Creek. Our little town is all grown up now!
Red Lion Inn.
The Farmhouse is still there.
https://thefarmhousechristiansburg.com/
It's been several years, but I remember it being quite good. Nicest option for when parents visited, or a major date..
IIRC, Beamer used it for team dinners the night before home games.
It was a fancy place. My first date with husband was there after Greek quarterly formal dance
While we're on the topics of great fancy restaurants outside of Blacksburg, anyone been to the Palisades restaurant in Eggleston lately? Went there after my commencement and we all agreed it was one of the best dining experiences we've ever had
When they first opened, we went there several times, and when I was guiding, it was a client dinner go to. Shana Muldoon always treated me like an old friend, the menu was interesting and eclectic. They also had chefs come in periodically for special dinners, if I remember right. In an old hardware store, it's a gem in Giles, for sure.
Yupp also went regularly when I got off the river clients or not. Took anyone visiting Blacksburg there. To this day still one of my favorite places to eat/drink. Was always treated like they knew me personally.
Palisades is legit. They just celebrated their 17th year. The bar is over 150 yrs old. Menu is incredible farm to table w seasonal variations. Can't go wrong. Cool place.
Palisades is awesome.
Had a GA tell me about The Palisades back in the 2010/2011 timeframe. It became a staple of mine for parent's visits through my grad school days, it was absolutely spectacular.
I'm happy to report I've been back as recently as December 2024 and it was still just as good as I remembered.
No my parents and grandfather always wanted to go to friends and family restaurant in pearieburg, which was fine ...
Not even close. As someone who's eaten at both many times, there is no comparison between the two. I often met clients at F&F for breakfast because of logistics, but for a decent meal after our day on the river, the Palisades was the spot after they opened.
Are you saying its not ever close to fine? Because I was being nice. It wasnt bad, its just not anything id recommend to anyone, but it was close to my grandfather's house.
Oh, I guess breakfast was usually ok enough to approach fine sorta, but like you, I wouldn't recommend it either. I do get close, and the Palisades is not super close to Pearisburg, and when grandpa's buying, well, wattaya do? Been 13 years or so since I left the area, so maybe they have gotten better, but when we've been back visiting, nobody goes to F&F that we know, opting for "better" somewhere else.
I haven't been there since like 2006