- June 18, 2021
- Posted by: Stratford Team
- Category: Business
HIGHLAND PARK, Mich. – Red Hots Coney Island made it through the Great Depression, a World War and the closure of the Ford Plant in Highland Park but now it’s closing down.
Red Hots near Woodward Avenue and the Davison Freeway couldn’t survive the COVID pandemic. Generations of the Harlan family ran the coney island and their regular customers became much more than just customers.
The owners, Rich and Carole Harlan, said people would walk in strangers and walk out as family. For a century, the business has been serving up signature coney dogs and chili.
“Original recipe since 1921. Rich still makes it in house,” Carole Harlan said.
Rich Harlan’s great uncle Tom started the family business shortly after World War I. Rich Harlan started working there in the 60s as a dishwasher.
“When I first started here there was no women working here it was strictly men,” Rich Harlan said. “The place was half the size it is now.”
Ad
Back then, the…
