Pat's Steak House Accepting Credit Cards, Existence of 21st Century

Pat's Steakhouse began taking credit cards "about two weeks ago," owner Pat Francis told Eater in a phone conversation. This ends a policy begun over a half-century ago, when Francis' father started Pat's. "My dad grew up in an orphan home during the depression," Francis said. "He was here before credit cards, and he hated them?he said they would ruin this country."

But Dad's been gone for about 25 years, and Francis' "son and daughter have been working on me for a while." Now servers carry cell phones to swipe all major credit cards ("I think it's called a square," said Francis) but will still accept cash, personal checks or business checks just like they did in the 1950s. "My son said we skipped a century," said Francis. "We still have house accounts?we're working [card readers] into the system. We've always been the old-fashioned way, but I think it's working out."
· Pat's Steakhouse [Official Site]
[Pat's Steak House via Facebook]