3.2 Commercial Frankston

Frankston Trading 1900-1945

The increased tourist trade after the turn of the century brought more businesses to the district and between the wars some of the food outlets sought to acquire a fashionable style. Principal amongst these was the cosmopolitan Frankston hamburger store "Hamburger Phil's Cafe" where Phil informed customers in 1937 that:

"the largest hot-plate and griller-toaster obtainable has just been installed at Hamburger Phil's. This rendezvous is very popular with the theatrical folk who often motor down to Frankston after the show to enjoy the coffee and other delicacies dispensed by him".1

More stylish and no doubt more sophisticated in its own right was another innovation, the coffee shop, which reached Frankston about the same time,

"It has come at last! A coffee lounge in Frankston. Now all we need is a Town Hall and a parking attendant with chalk in hand to become a city".

So the Standard gleefully welcomed the opening of Gibby's coffee lounge in Frankston; "a good cup of coffee among friends in the soft-shaded atmosphere for which Gibby's have become famous". The other cafe most often mentioned by older residents was the Continental Cafe. With its red carpets, its soda fountain and its plush seats booths it was even classy enough to attract local wedding receptions.2 By the 1950s coffee lounges and hamburger joints became identified with a suburban danger, that of bodgies and widgies and the Standard rued the baneful influence of the hamburger joint on the suburb's youth.3 Church groups began to hold jazz evenings to attract the young away from the new diseases of American pop music. Council in the 1960s allowed a promoter to put on "mod" dances at the Mechanic's Institute.

However having misjudged the changing fashions in teenage taste he asked council to terminate his lease. The youth of Frankston were once again turned loose on the hamburger joints. Some cafes appealed to a more sedate suburban clientele, the Pink Lady for example, hardly a bodgie hangout, but home for the lady shopper's morning tea:-"any time is coffee time at the Pink Lady."4