RESTAURANT OWNER IS A W. VAN iNSTITUTION

Horseshoe Bay's unofficial
mayor adds spice to life

JOE TROLL emerges from the darkness of the service way
— ameole from a long winter’s hibernation. Squinting, he
screws up his nose as if testing the air and surveys the res-
taurant for the famiiiar voice he came out to track.
Waitresses: watch him —- horrified.

There he stands, a fish knife
dangling from one hand, in fish
encrusted boots, a plastic apron,
undervest and the coup de grace:
boxer shorts.

Joe scans the diners, unaware of
the stir he’s creating.

Suddenly he locates the voice
and the unofficial mayor of
Horseshoe Bay is off. He shuffles
up to the table and
unceremoniously plonks himself
next to voice’s wife, boxers and
all. “Oh hi, thought I recognized
your voice. Boy, your wife is get-
ting prettier every day.”

Joe Troll, founder of Troli's
Restaurant, is no respecter of
social convention. He has been
assailing customers in this manner
for decades and they love it.

Eccentric, outspoken, volatile —
all words used by acquaintances to
describe Joe and all accurate. For
the truth about Joe Troll is that he
simply doesn’t care what people
think about him. Self-image is not
a word in his vocabulary.

Joe came to Halifax by boat in
1930 with his parents and six
brothers and sisters. They left the
Black Forest in Germany when his
father, them in the lumber
business, went bankrupt.

By ELIZABETH COLLINGS
News Reporter

The Trolis arrived in Edmonton

by train, where they lived for five
years.
“*We had a very tough time. I
was selling papers on the street for
keep. In those days you had to
have a licence. It cost 25 cents to
sell papers, so I had to take an in-
terpreter with me. We weren't very
good at it,”” he chuckles.

In 1935 Joe moved with his fam-
ily to Vancouver where he first
worked in restaurants.

Joe started Troll’s in 1946 as a
fish and chip stand. His staff came
to a grand total of two: himself
and his wife, Dorothy. Fish and
chips cost 25 cents a shot and the
restaurant was ‘‘just like a big
garage,”’ as Joe telis it. His con-
temporaries say, less charitably, it
was a ‘‘shack.””

Joe says he was dependent on
the summer cottage trade. ‘‘In
those days you could only operate
from May the 24th to Labor Day
and business wasn’t all that
good.”’ He worked the winters in
Vancouver restaurants to make
ends meet.

But business quickly improved

s

CM AR KE

for Joe. With the advent of the
Horseshoe Bay ferry terminal in
1952, Troll’s grew steadily in size
and popularity. From the tiny
shack it once was, Troll’s has ex-
panded to the point where it now
has a seating capacity of 100, with
an additional outside section for
the warmer months.

In the summer, the restaurant
has lineups out the door, and in
the winter Troll’s continues to
make a tidy sum with its brisk
lunch and dinner trade.

But success hasn’t changed Joe,
and people insist that Joe made the
restaurant what it is today: a mil-
lion dollar proposition.

Tommy Sewell, of Sewell’s
Marina, says the success of Troll’s
is due in part to ‘‘hard work,
dedication, and a hell of a lot of
self-sacrifice — which Joe did.”

But the rest of it, Seweil says, is
simply the old man hivnself: ‘He
had that style about him. People
would come because of Joe Troll.”

Although fish and chips is his
business, Joe’s first love is calking
to his customers.

And how he loves to talk. Joe
virtually built Troll’s on his ability
to greet patrons with a warm wel-
come and a smattering of his, well,
somewhat unique persona.

Joe is a natural with people and
they sense it; through the years he
has built up a following. Some at-

See Joo’s
Page 48

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PAGE 51

NEWS Lucente
JOE TROLL, founder of Troil’s Restaurant in Horseshoe Bay, bas trad-
ed the fish ’n’ chips business for the sore peaceful game of golf. but still
likes to chat with customers.

homé-Consultation.

ne, Drive. North Van

47 - Wedne:.2ay, July 12, £989 ~ North Shore News