Checkerboard Restaurant Pleasantville, Iowa. Family Dining, best food and dining in Iowa.

Checkerboard Restaurant History

From it's beginning in a rented building with only 10 tables, the Checkerboard Restaurant has grown into a Pleasantville mainstay. In July, 1975, the Checkerboard Pizza Shack opened across the street from it's current location. Operation with a handful of tables and an arcade, the main focus was on pizza.

A year later, an opportunity to buy the old teen center building arose and the restaurant moved to it's current location. In October, 1984, Pleasantville grew enough to merit it's first stoplight, although it was at the Checkerboard. It hangs at the end of the boardwalk, instructing patrons to either wait to be seated or to go ahead and seat themselves.

With an expanded menu, including homemade pies, lunch specials, dinners and their famous onion rings, the business has tripled in size. Changing to reflect it's menu variety, the owners, Karen and Ron Fee, decided to rename it the Checkerboard Restaurant a few years later.

For many years, the back half of the restaurant continued to operate as an arcade, but as business grew, the number of video games began to shrink, until there weren't any remaining. The business has evolved into many things, still keeping the restaurant as it's core.

In the 1980s, there was the concession trailer, the bar and dance floor, the limousine service, then the tea room. There has also been an antique shop and gift shop in the basement. It's anyone's guess what might come next.

Karen's love of antiques is evident everywhere you look in the Checkerboard. There are things ranging from the antiques, such as the Roy Rogers collectibles, to the usual, such as the deer that you see coming and going. Each piece in the resturant has been lovingly selected by Karen from antique shows all across the United States.

At a young age, Karen and Ron learned first-hand how to run a business. For many years, Karen's father and mother, Leland and Betty Clark, ran Clark's Grocery store on the southeast edge of Pleasantville. They began with a tiny gas station, selling just the staples, but it grew to become a full service grocery store. Karen and Ronnie spent so much time there helping out that their Children, Rhonda and Mike, literally grew up in the grocery store.

Whether it was finding a quiet place to nap on the shelves or ride in a shopping cart, the children were at home there.

After Karen's father suffered some health problems, Ronnie filled in as the butcher for the grocery store. He credits is knowledge of quality to this work experience; all of the steaks served at the restaurant are individually selected. It's part of the Checkerboard philosophy that you don't compete with family, so it wasn't until after Shorty's, a local steakhouse owned by Karen's uncle, closed that steaks appeared on the menu.

Family is very important at the Checkerboard, this is a business that wouldn't have been successful without the help of family. Ron and Karen's parents, siblings, children and grandchildren have all helped by either working at the restaurant or with building upkeep and updating. You see the photos of loved ones who are gone, but not forgotten, hanging on the walls. And, you meet the closeknit group of employees who become more like family as the years go by.

At a young age, Ron and Karen's children, Rhonda and Mike, started working at the restaurant. Since the restaurant was originally only open in the evenings the children bussed tables after the supper rush.

As they grew, so did their responsiblities. A teenager, Rhonda worked as a waitress, bussed tables and prepared food. Once he was old enough, Mike worked in the kitchen, although his favorite thing was sitting down, talking to the customers and sharing their food. Rhonda was always the more serious of the two, and she took to the business aspects of the restaurant. Because of all of her hard work, Rhonda is now the manager.

Rhonda met Marty Zimmerman, her husband, when he was a customer at the restaurant. When they decided to get married, Rhonda and Marty had their wedding in the most familiar of places, the Checkerboard. Since Saturday is one of their busiest days, te wedding took place on a Sunday. The fence along the boardwalk was lined with bows and they were married under a bug arch in the side room.

Soon there were other additions to the family; when Amanda was little, she spent a great deal of time on the hip of a waitress, dressed up like a cowgirl. As soon as they could reach, Amanda and her little sister, Alyssa, stood on chairs and bussed tables. If they were fortunate to get a tip, they would be so excited and would always ask grandma if it was for them to keep. The two girls grew up in the Checkerboard, surrounded by family and friends, much in the same way that Ron and Karen's children had grown up in the grocery store. Alyssa has fond memories of making music with wooden spoons and turned-over pots and pans.

The girls, always aware of grandma's no-kids-in-the-kitchen policy, still managed to sneak back and see grandpa every now and then. Amanda graduated from Iowa State University with a bachelors degree in child and family services. She is currently working as a case manager for Warren County and living in Pleasantville. Alyssa graduated from the University of Northern Iowa with a bachelors degree in social work. She is currently working at Brody Middle School in Des Moines and lives in Ankeny. In addition to Ron and Karen's four grandkids, they also have five great-grandkids. You can usually see Amanda helping out on the weekends and Alyssa helps out if needed.

Mike continued to work at the restaurant after high school until he moved on to make his own way, returning to help out when needed. Mike lived life in a big way, head-on. He loved talking with people and was always on to his next great idea. He lived a full and active life, but it was cut short. On January 15, 1995, he was tragically killed in a car accident; he was 27.

His memory is still very present in the restaurant, with many pictures of him and his favorite things decorating the walls. There is the cowboy outfit he wore when he was little, his racing t-shirts from the Knoxville sprint cars, pictures from his fishing trips to Minnesota and Canada and, most importantly, photos of him with family who still love and miss him.

In November of 2003, Marty and Rhonda traveled to Kazakhstan to adopt a two year old boy, whom they named Noah Michael Zimmerman. Then in June of 2006, they traveled again to Kazakhstan to adopt another two year old boy, whom they named Ethan Joel Zimmerman. They have both been a huge blessing to the whole family.

The Checkerboard is more than a business to Ron and Karen, ti is their life. Over the years, so many events have taken place here, so many people have come and gone, some only visiting once, others becoming lifelong friends.

No matter, whether it is Karen's colorful hello or Ronnie's sense of humor that you remember, your visit to the Checkerboard will not soon be forgotten.