Family: The story behind the Sunrise Diner, packed on Purdue game days

EDITOR'S NOTE: The following is part of an ongoing series featuring eateries Boilermaker faithful may frequent before or after a Boilermaker home game. Do you have favorite? Email Noe Padilla at npadilla@gannett.com.

LAFAYETTE, Ind. — Along the walls of the Sunrise Diner hangs posters, photos and newspapers of historical moments documenting the history of Lafayette and the United States.

In the back of the restaurant, sits a room decorated with Purdue University and other sports memorabilia the restaurant has acquired over the years. The downtown Lafayette eatery even has a room dedicated to Indiana University — spoiler, it’s the restaurant’s broom closet.

And over the past 35 years of business, Don McClean, the young, 79-year-old owner of the Sunrise Diner, has curated his restaurant’s unique aesthetic into the diner it is today.

But perhaps the most interesting story of the Sunrise Diner can be found behind the counter, with McClean and his family’s dedication to the citizens of Lafayette.

The History of the Sunrise Diner

Unlike many in the restaurant business, McClean didn’t initially open his diner out of a particular love for cooking or the industry.

His four-decade passion was a byproduct of a sale gone wrong.

Prior to the diner, McClean ran McClean Builders, a local construction business, where McClean and his crew would build homes and renovate businesses.

After one of these renovations, the customers ran out of money to pay McClean and offered him a restaurant as payment instead.

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“The only reason that I got out of the building business was because I was turning 50, and I did a job for a guy who had a restaurant. I expanded it. He wanted to put a smorgasbord in. Well, come time to pay me, he had no money. So, he said, ‘I got a restaurant I’ll give you downtown,’” said McClean.

“At first, I was, like, I don’t want no damn restaurant. But then I thought about it. Well, I’m 50, by the time I’m 60, I’m not going to be able to climb ladders and work. You know, I’m getting old. So, I took it, and he said he’d make the payments. Well, that lasted two months, and I got screwed big time. But that’s how I got into the restaurant business.”

In 1985, Don and Janet McClean became the new owners of a restaurant on 830 Main St. At the time, they had no clue what to call it.

“I remember them saying, ‘What do you name a restaurant when you don’t run restaurants?'" recalled Kerry Boots, McClean’s granddaughter, telling the story of how her grandparents came up with the name for their new restaurant.

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“Well, on one of the drives that he used to do for work, he would always pass this one motel that was called the Sunset Motel, and he really liked the name. So, that’s when he came up with the name, Sunrise Diner.”

And with that, the Sunrise Diner was born.

Needed a bigger location

Early in the business, although McClean would open the restaurant at 6 a.m., he would need to periodically take off throughout the day to still run his construction business. Because of that, the restaurant was primarily operated by McClean’s mother and aunt.

That was how they operated until 1998, when McClean decided that they needed a bigger location and bought the old Coney Island location at the corner of Columbia and Fifth streets.

Their initial location could serve up to 40 people at a time, but the new spot doubled that capacity to around 80 customers.

With this new expansion, McClean decided to retire his working boots and pick up the spatula full time. That's when Sunrise Diner truly became a multi-generational, family-operated restaurant.

“Although I didn’t officially start working at the restaurant until I was 16, I remember on a busy day, I would be behind the register as a 10-year-old, helping my mom and Grandpa run the diner,” said Boots.

With McClean in the back cooking up meals, he would have his wife and daughters, Tina McClean and Rhea King, running the dining room. His granddaughters, Kerry Boots and Devean King, would also occasionally come in to help run the restaurant.

The Purdue Room

To say that the McCleans are Purdue fans would be an understatement for anyone who’s had the opportunity to sit in the sports memorabilia room.

The walls are decorated with large Purdue flags, action shots of athletes and other historical sports treasures.

Much of the McCleans’ love for Purdue stemmed from Janet, who was a Purdue alumna, worked at Purdue and supported the team with the fury of any loyal fan.

Whenever a Purdue athlete comes into the diner, McClean gets giddy about the idea of talking to the young Boilermaker, recalled Boots.

But to McClean, the backroom isn’t just a room to highlight Purdue.

“This is a sports room," he said. "We have things from Purdue, high school, and whatever. A guy reached out to me and sent me an Ohio State flag and I hung it up.”

Much of the memorabilia found in the diner has been donated to the McCleans from people within the Greater Lafayette community.

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“I have old radios, cameras and things. People bring them in and give them to me. I said to them, 'I’m not a hoarder.' I got this old camera, somebody came in and told me that the wife said that she wanted us to have it. So, he brought me in two old cameras, and said, ‘My wife wants you to have this when she died.’ Most of this stuff has been given to me over the years."

When asked why they’re willing to display so much memorabilia, Boots said, “I think people give things to us because they know they’ll have a second life here. Where people can enjoy looking at them after they're gone.”

What does it mean to be 80?

For as young as McClean looks, the joyful man in the kitchen cooking up every dish will be turning 80 in October.

For the past 35 years, McClean has been making meals on the grill nonstop, seven days a week, only turning it off on special occasions.

When asked how he’s able to do it, he says it's because he feels 20 years younger than he actually is.

“I don’t feel old. When somebody asked what it feels like to be 80, I always tell them, 'I don’t know, I’ve never been 80 before, so how are you supposed to feel?'” joked McClean.

“I get up and go to work. I get tired sometimes, but that’s part of life. If I sit down in a chair for 20 minutes, I’ll probably fall asleep. I work, and I keep myself busy. I quit around 8:30 at night, take my shower, go to bed around 9, get up at 3:30 in the morning and start again. That’s it.”

After working for almost 60 years, McClean has considered retiring at some point.

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“I know I’ll slow down, and I’ll retire pretty soon. It’ll happen, I mean, obviously, I’m not going to live another 25 years. The law of averages says that. So, I need to do something besides working 24/7. Maybe go home and sit on my decks. I got three decks on my house that I don’t get to use.”

Looking back on his time as the owner of the Sunrise Diner and what that meant to him and the community, he sat for a moment, unsure what to say.

“What does the community mean to me? I don’t know how to answer that one. The community has been good to me, because it’s supported me for 37 years in the restaurant business, and it was good to me in the building business.

“The community has been good to me; the mayor has been good to me. I knew him when he was a cop. I got doctors and lawyers that come in here. The community has just been really good to me and they supported me.”

This article originally appeared on Lafayette Journal & Courier: Family: The story behind the Sunrise Diner, packed on Purdue game days