Turning The Tables Grateful Restaurant Owners Plan Thanksgiving For 1,000, With Mayor And Police Chief Among Servers

When Larry Peterson hit bottom 20 years ago - drunk, destitute and down on his luck - he vowed that if he ever got back on his feet, he’d give back to society.

He’s making good on that pledge this Thursday.

Peterson and his wife, Diane, are staging a communitywide Thanksgiving feast at the Apple Cup Cafe, which they bought earlier this year.

The Petersons are picking up the tab for what they expect to be at least 1,000 meals for Chelan-Manson area residents.

“The purpose is to put aside the (local) politics and the economics for a day, and let’s all sit down and break bread and give thanks to the beautiful place we live in,” Peterson said.

Several organizations - including the Soroptomists, Lions Club and Masonic Lodge - have agreed to help out. Police Chief Ed Bush, Mayor Ron Sloan and other officials plan to serve meals. Any monetary donations will be given to the Chelan Food Bank. Lions Club members also will deliver meals to shut-ins.

Peterson said he and his wife and sons Justin and Ryan are “so darn grateful for the way the community has given to the restaurant, that we want to give back to the community.”

Peterson’s early struggles are also a factor.

He grew up in Montana and moved to Portland when he was 14. He started drinking and got kicked out of high school, earning his GED after joining the Army in 1965. The drinking continued in Vietnam.

Peterson lived in the Leavenworth and Cashmere areas between 1968 and 1973. He attended Gonzaga University for a time. He moved back to Portland in 1973.

In 1975, he blacked out while driving 70 mph on an Oregon freeway and slammed head-on into another car. He broke 38 major bones and spent 133 days in the hospital. He was sued by the other driver, who also was badly injured.

That same year, he filed for bankruptcy, got divorced and lost his older brother , Bill, in a house fire.

He wound up unemployed, living in a rooming house and hanging out on Portland’s Skid Row. “I was hunting for money, hunting for food. I was really destitute,” he said.

The turning point came when he was 29, after he prayed for the first time in years. A judge suggested he check into a treatment center.

“I had hit bottom,” Peterson says. “I was sick and tired of being sick and tired all the time.”

He’s been sober since April 1977.

He went back to college, graduating in 1979 with a degree in business administration from the University of Washington. He returned to Portland in 1980 and worked as an alcohol and drug counselor with Comprehensive Care Corp. He met his wife that year at a recovery-support group.

Three years later, they moved to Sacramento, Calif., where Peterson served as an assistant hospital administrator. He later joined Sterling Health Care, working as a hospital administrator in Colorado, New Mexico and Indiana.

But he’d been looking to get back to north-central Washington, and when he learned the Apple Cup Cafe was for sale, he and his wife made the move. His father, Bud, owned the Edelweiss restaurant in Leavenworth and the Evergreen Cafe in Cashmere in the 1960s and 1970s.

Sales have been running 18 percent higher than expected since they bought the place in February.

“I decided that if I ever got to this point, that I’d give back,” Peterson said.

“And it’s just amazing the number of people who’ve volunteered to wait tables and wash dishes that day.”