By Jillian L. Martinez
Over 40 years ago, a group of women started to gather for lunch after their adult ice dance lessons at their local Highland Park ice rink. The group based out of the Chicago suburb was made up of beginner and lifelong skaters alike. They took their post-skating lunches to the fast-food restaurant Wendy’s and began referring to themselves as the “Wendy’s Lunch Bunch.”
“I was very, very determined and [skating] was always something I loved to watch and wanted to do. In the process of taking lessons, I took a group lesson, and that is where all the ladies got to meet each other,” said Lois Todd, a former adult skater and current judge, who moved to Highland Park in the early 1980s with her late husband. “We would skate from about 10 a.m. to 12 or 12:30 p.m. [on Tuesdays]. One day, we decided to go to lunch. And, then lunch turned into every week.”
Celebrating Hazel’s 80th birthday
Todd, now 83 and the oldest member of the group, explained Wendy’s became the ideal location because it was a restaurant where everyone could order what they wanted and they would not kick the group out if they sat and talked for hours. According to Todd, there were days where the group would lose track of time and wouldn’t leave until 4 o’clock.
“Somebody would realize what time it was and say, ‘Oh, I have to go and make dinner,’” Todd laughed.
Since the inaugural Tuesday post-skating Wendy’s lunch, more than 20 people have been a part of the close-knit group. Over the years, members have lost interest in skating, moved away from the Chicago metropolitan area or passed away. Although the group mostly comprised of older women, there were two men who joined the group over the years. Regardless, everyone and anyone was welcome to join – the only requirement was that individuals had to be able to “speak skating.”
Pat Smith, a longtime member of the Detroit Skating Club, began skating as a child and continued throughout her life as an adult competitor, coach and judge. In 1986, Smith joined the group after her skating friends (which included Todd and other ladies from the Lunch Bunch) from her summer vacations in Sun Valley, Idaho, connected her.
“When I first moved to Chicago my friend Caroline told me to keep Tuesday open,” said Smith, who is still considered the “newest” member of the group. “I asked why. She told me, ‘Because we skate on Tuesdays.’ I was delighted and grateful to join their group, and they’ve been lifetime friends ever since.”
To maintain their sense of community and regularity of outings, the Lunch Bunch created bylaws, matching sweatshirts and special traditions for birthdays (namely, customized table mats).
“You had to go skating before lunch. If you couldn’t skate, you needed a doctor’s note. And, you had to come to lunch in your sweatshirt,” Smith shared. “Those were the basic bylaws, and they really stuck for years.”
Unfortunately, Smith is the only member in the group to still skate these days. Some, like Todd, no longer feel comfortable skating on the ice due to their age. Others never returned to the ice after the group's beloved Tuesday morning session was canceled at the start of the COVID-19 pandemic. Nonetheless, the lunches have continued for the eight members still involved and, now, occasionally take place at Panera Bread. Outside of their weekly lunch, members of the group have been highly involved in their respective skating clubs and have served as skating officials locally and nationally. The Bunch has also made a tradition of purchasing tickets for every U.S. Championships as soon as they become available and have even attended Skate America©, World Championships and Winter Olympics Games together.
“Lois and I going to [1994 Winter Olympics in] Lillehammer was fantastic,” Smith reminisced. “We enjoyed [the 1998] Worlds in Minneapolis. Then, when Skate America© was in Detroit, we drove from Chicago to go there. And, since I’m a Detroiter, I knew all the places for us to go! So, we went shoe shopping, we went to the cider mill… We did all kinds of stuff.”
The Lunch Bunch has been there for one another through all of life’s successes, challenges and milestones. Collectively, the group has stood by one another through cancer treatments, relocations to senior living facilities and, even, passings amongst group members and their spouses. Through it all, the Lunch Brunch has remained a constant the friends could depend on.
“Although we've all gotten older, we still manage to get together, discuss skating, who's doing what, what their grandchildren are doing… just like regular ladies,” Todd said. “We really just support each other.”
