Here at the top of Steam Valley Mountain, the Fry family owns and operates a full-service family restaurant specializing in homemade, Thanksgiving-style turkey dinners and a full menu of other delicious items. In addition, we also run a Mini Mart offering Sunoco gasoline and diesel, offroad diesel and kerosene. We make pizzas, hoagies and sandwiches to order and offer a wide range of beverages, chips, snacks, deli items and many other products. We've been here since 1939 and this is our story...

 

William Fry came from Germany around 1865 and got his start by opening his own meat market in 1886. During World Wars I and II he and his sons, Howard Sr. and Raymond, operated in several places in the Williamsport area including the Curbstone and Growers' Markets. In 1938, these same two brothers bought the farmland where the present Fry Brothers’ Turkey Ranch stands, an area known as Steam Valley.

 

The restaurant was opened at the current location on Mothers’ Day in 1939 and specialized in turkey dinners at a time when turkey was a rare delicacy. World War II forced the restaurant’s temporary closing but the brothers continued raising turkeys and kept the market going, raising up to 15,000 turkeys per year for the war effort. After the war they sold the business in the Growers’ Market just three days before the devastating flood of 1946. In the same year they reopened the restaurant, again on Mothers’ Day.

 

in 1950, after the death of Howard Sr., LeMoyne Fry and her son Howard Jr. took over management until 1967 when Howard Jr and his wife Lois became sole owners. The turkey barns were destroyed in 1970 to make room for the new Route 15 highway, thus ending the era of raising our own turkeys.

 

Dwight (Ike) Fry worked side-by-side with his parents since the age of 12. After the death of Howard Jr. in 2001, Ike and his mother Lois continued to run the family business along with manager Susan Kreger. Ike’s son and daughter-in-law, Nathan and Daniela, have rejoined the family business. Ike and Nathan represent the fourth and fifth generations of the Fry family to have contributed to the success of the Fry businesses.

 

Our restaurant now seats approximately 300 people, is open 364 days a year and serves approximately 100,000 customers per year. Mothers’ Day, 2014, marked our 75th anniversary on top of Steam Valley Mountain. In all those years of business at this location we have roasted over 150,000 turkeys and served approximately 1 million turkey dinners. We would like to sincerely thank all of our customers and employees throughout the years who have made all of this possible. With your continued patronage we look forward to celebrating many more years of serving the community with you and your family.