Jakes Seafood closing Route 1 location
Jakes Seafood, a family-owned restaurant whose proprietors have a 30-year history in Cape Region’s food industry, has announced its last day of business is Sunday, Sept. 20.
Jakes has been located on Route 1 north of Rehoboth since March 2003, and owners Billy and Lois Klemkowski made the announcement on the restaurant’s Facebook page Sept. 14.
“Jakes Seafood will be closing,” they said matter-of-factly. “Lois and I will be turning the page with Jakes Seafood House and starting a new chapter in our lives. It has been a wonderful 17 years.”
The Route 1 location is the second Jakes Seafood the Klemkowskis operated. The original restaurant opened in 1988 in downtown Rehoboth Beach, on the northwest corner of First Street and Baltimore Avenue. That restaurant closed in 2017, after nearly 30 years of business.
Jakes has been a family-owned operation from the beginning. According to a Cape Gazette story from when the downtown restaurant closed, the Klemkowskis and Billy’s mother, Rosemary, opened the original carryout seafood restaurant. Keeping it in the family, the Klemkowskis made sure to mention the closure of the highway location will end the Jakes career of their son Will, who has been working for his parents in some way since he was 13.
“We cannot thank Will enough for all his hard work and dedication to Jakes,” said the Klemkowskis.
The pair also thank their employees.
“We all had lots of fun at Jakes,” Billy and Lois said. “We worked next to many of you in the back as well as the front of Jakes.”
The Klemkowskis encourage former employees and patrons to stop by the restaurant before it closes to share some drinks and have some laughs.
For more information, Jakes Seafood, 19178 Coastal Highway, can be reached at 302-644-7711 or www.jakesseafoodhouse.com.
Chris Flood has been working for the Cape Gazette since early 2014 and has the local parking passes to prove it. He currently covers Rehoboth Beach and Henlopen Acres, but has also covered Dewey Beach and the state government. He covers environmental stories, business stories, random stories on subjects he finds interesting and has a column called ‘Choppin’ Wood’ that runs every other week. Additionally, Chris moonlights as the company’s circulation manager, which primarily means fixing boxes during daylight hours that are jammed with coins, but sometimes means delivering papers in the middle of the night. He’s a graduate of the University of Maine and the Landing School of Boat Building & Design. People are often surprised to learn that Chris has a wife and two kids.
