Superdawg Founder, Maurie Berman, Passes Away At 89
By Selena Fragassi in Food on May 18, 2015 4:15PM
Courtesy of Superdawg
It’s a super sad time for Superdawg as the famed hot dog drive-in announced over the weekend that founder Maurie Berman passed away from heart problems at the age of 89.
“We are deeply saddened by the death today of our husband, father, grandfather, and great-grandfather,” said the restaurant in a statement. They will close both the Chicago (6363 N. Milwaukee Ave.) and Wheeling (333 S. Milwaukee Ave.) locations tomorrow, Tuesday, May 19, in his memory.
Berman, a military veteran who fought in the Battle of the Bulge, opened the drive-in in 1948 with his wife Flaurie just a year after they married as a trendy way to “supplement student incomes on the GI Bill after World War II,” said the Chicago Tribune. Though the hot dog connoisseur wanted it to be not any old food stand, so he designed it with an airport control tower ordering station and the iconic 12-foot-tall hot dog statues that sit atop the roof, one flexing in a skimpy leopard suit and the other a more sheepish version wearing a tutu—the “alter egos” of Berman and his wife (both Von Steuben High graduates) who also worked as a CPA and a CPS teacher, respectively. Superdawg was what they did in their summer off-season.
“He didn’t have hobbies. …He loved Superdawg …and he loved making people happy,” son Scott Berman told DNAinfo Chicago.
The version of the Chicago hot dog he created was just as memorable said the publication: “A pure beef frank in a poppy seed bun topped with mustard, piccalilli, a dill pickle, chopped Spanish onions and a "memorable" hot pepper and absolutely no ketchup.” Berman also created his own fry machine that to this day cuts the crinkly sticks. Though Superdawg never had the chain success of other notables like McDonalds and Burger King, the original location on Milwaukee Avenue on the far Northwest side did predate many of those restaurants that capitalized on the convenience of the drive-thru. A second location in Wheeling only came around as recently as 2010.
Berman leaves behind Flaurie, his wife of 68 years, three children, five grandchildren and a great-grandchild, all of whom have continued on with the family-run business and look to do so for the foreseeable future.