At the Tom Thumb Drive In, Kirk Cairney vows to make sure the high standards for food and customer-friendly service set by his father are maintained by whomever might purchase the 52-year-old restaurant.

“It’s been up for sale for almost three years. We’ve had a lot of people come and look,” he said. “I would want them to continue to go with our traditions. It would be foolish to come in and change the menu. Or to change our commitment to customer service. I believe we’re successful because of what we do and how we do it.”

Meanwhile, Cairney, 57, has no intention of letting up on the gas – despite the long hours (4 a.m. to 1-2 p.m., six days a week) and staffing challenges that come with the territory in the only job he’s ever had since joining the family business right out of high school.

“When my father died,” he said, “people asked what was going to happen to Tom Thumb. Nothing is going to change. We were here yesterday, we are here today, we’ll be here tomorrow. I have every intention of doing what my father had done, find someone to run the business.”

The restaurant, located on the city’s west side, across U.S. Highway 169 from Iowa Central Community College, is open from 6 a.m. to 10 p.m. seven days a week, and serves breakfast, lunch and dinner. It has a loyal customer following. And a huge “alumni association” of hundreds who worked there as part-timers over the years, learning the value of customer service and hard work.

In a review of Tom Thumb a year ago, Raymond Goldfield, a travel writer for the web site, “Only in Your State,” wrote:

“The old-school drive-in is far from dead in Iowa, and heading to Fort Dodge will uncover one of the best out there. The Tom Thumb Drive-In has been operating since the 1950s, with some regulars proudly announcing they’ve been going there for half a century or more. But unlike so many similar places, this drive-in restaurant in Iowa doesn’t limit itself to car traffic. It actually doubles as a small diner, allowing people to enjoy their meals in a charming old-school setting. The surprisingly extensive menu dishes out retro comfort food that sometimes feels like it hasn’t changed since the 1950s – but that’s part of the charm! So hop in the car, order up, and take a trip back in time at this one-of-a-kind Iowa eatery.”

Helping bring more customer traffic to the restaurant is a Dairy Queen franchise it owns and is housed in the same building, with its own in-store counter and a separate drive-thru window. “Dairy Queen is a national name,” Cairney said. “It’s a big draw.”

Tom Thumb’s “retro comfort food” mentioned by the writer includes the restaurant’s most popular menu item – chicken and noodles over mashed potatoes and gravy.

“My father started that,” Cairney said, “I had never heard of it. But we sell a lot of everything – hamburgers and tenderloin sandwiches.

“We have a smoker, and we smoke all our own products. My father started doing the smoking years ago, and I took it over 15 years ago. I’m in at 4 in the morning to get it started. So many people tell us our ribs are the best they’ve ever had. We also smoke ribs, brisket, pork loin, pulled pork, brats. We used to use apple wood, but now we use cherry and hickory to smoke everything. The seasoning we use was made by Jim Ertl, who worked with my father.”

Ertl created his “Ertl Famous Seasoning” in 1959 and it remains in use today (minus the paprika) for all of Tom Thumb’s meat menu items – as well as his recipe for beef gravy. Ertl – who Kirk Cairney said was a “great chef” – now lives in Webster City.

Tom Thumb’s roots trace to Kirk’s father Tom Cairney – a pioneer in the phenomenon of drive-through restaurants that began popping up in Fort Dodge in the 1950s and ’60s.

In 1959, he left his job in sales with Farner-Bocken Wholesale Tobacco Co. to purchase Bohan Drug at First Avenue North and Eighth Street and create Tom’s Lunch, which he owned and operated for six years. (“You could buy 13 or 15 burgers for a dollar, legend has it,” Kirk said.) In 1965 Tom purchased Henry’s Hamburgers on Second Avenue South and built a second Henry’s Hamburgers at the Crossroads Mall (in a building where Ja-Mar Drive In restaurant is now located).

He built Tom Thumb Drive In in 1971 and owned and operated it until his death in 2018 at the age of 89. He owned or had partial ownership in numerous other businesses including Henry’s Hamburgers in Des Moines and in Emporia, Kansas, Tom Thumb Deli, Tom Thumb catering, three Dairy Queen’s and two P & P Convenience Stores. He purchased the Villager – which was the original Colonial Inn – with Jim Ertl in 1978. Two years later, Ertl and Cairney built the Colonial Inn/Bank Shot and operated it until 1998 when it was destroyed by a fire. They also managed the food service cafeteria at Iowa Central Community College for eight years.

Tom Cairney and his wife of 65 years, Phyllis, donated to Iowa Central Community College in 2011 the land on which the Colonial Inn once stood. The college is now building a 9,200-square-foot fuel testing laboratory on the site that includes land also donated by Caseys General Stores. Groundbreaking took place July 17.

Phyllis Cairney, who is 90, continues to live in the family home just north of Fort Dodge.

Perhaps the most important legacy of Tom Cairney, one that his son works to keep alive, was his impact on people. From Tom’s obituary: “Tom influenced countless people through his Tom Thumb Family. He was a role model, father figure and mentor. He taught customer service and hard work, while helping young people to become responsible adults.”

There’s a tie between Tom Thumb and Ja-Mar Drive In, another popular Fort Dodge family-owned restaurant. Tom Cairney and Jim Jordison were partners in opening the Henry’s restaurant at Second Avenue South and Third Street, Kirk said. Jim opened Ja-Mar in 1971 at the same time Tom opened Tom Thumb, and today Ja-Mar is operated by Jim’s son, Jerry.

“We’ve always been friends,” Kirk said. “Our businesses still work together from time to time. We’ve always been that way. We’re very similar restaurants. Our fathers worked together, now their sons run their businesses.”

Kirk Cairney started working for his father when he was 12, washing dishes at the Colonial Inn – which once stood in what is now a parking lot of Tom Thumb on its north side.

The day after he graduated on a Sunday in 1984 from St. Edmond High School, Kirk was at work at Tom Thumb the next day and has been in the business since. His brother Kevin and sister Kris also worked for their father. Kevin was night manager at Tom Thumb and then ran the Tom Thumb Deli on 15th Street until 1989. Kris now lives with her family in Urbandale and Kevin lives with his family in Altoona.

Kirk worked at Tom Thumb for two years, joined the food service enterprise across the highway at Iowa Central for three years, then returned to Tom Thumb in 1989.

“Restaurant work is hard work,” he said. “Someone once mentioned to me, it must be so hard to work for your father since his standards are so high. My standards are through the ceiling. But those standards are hard to maintain anymore.”

Like most restaurant owners, Cairney is challenged by a shortage of staff – Tom Thumb employs 45-55 people in full-time and part-time roles. The shortage was most acute during the COVID outbreak three years ago.

“About 20 percent of our employees are 14 or 15 years old,” he said. “It’s a challenge to work with them. It’s fun to work with them when they really want to work. I’ve learned to be a lot more patient with them than I had been, and I think that comes from having grandchildren.”

Cairney has a daughter, Amanda, a school teacher who lives in Greenwood, Indiana., and three stepsons from an earlier marriage – Austen, Zach and Tyler – and grandchildren Hayden, Ava and Orth.

Two of an original group of four from Tom Cairney’s management days are still at the restaurant. Kirk Moore is day manager of Tom Thumb’s and has been with the company 38 years.

Mike Chardoulias was night manager for 39 years until his death a year ago. He had worked in his family’s business, the Melody Grill, from the age of 9 until it closed in 1982 when he joined Tom Thumb. Kevin Parks was Tom Thumb’s bakery manager, making all of its breads and buns which were once sold to a dozen other businesses. He died Aug. 19.

“All of us, we had an extremely high work ethic,” Cairney said. “All became successful through the restaurant. Kirk Moore and I survive, two old dogs in the building. When we were hired, we didn’t ask what we were going to do, what our pay would be. You just showed up, never questioned it, you just did it.”

Cairney said he is still looking for a baker and an assistant manager. The restaurant sports a large menu – with about 30 meat dishes alone – and still makes and sells pies and rolls.

Most restaurants in Fort Dodge these days belong to chains, Cairney said, adding, “It’s hard to be a little guy in a big guy’s world.

“But we’ve survived. It’s kind of like the old television show ‘Cheers’ where everyone knows your name. I think of Tom Thumb in that way. It’s kind of like a small community…we know so many of the families. It’s amazing how many families keep coming in. It’s the Tom Thumb Family. The seasoning we still use was made by Jim Ertl from my father’s days. There is a little more personality and person-to-person touch than in a corporate setting.

“I’d like Tom Thumb to never go away. It’s a unique business.”