(Harriet is the descendent of Joseph Weisel (1775-1827) - Michael Weisel (1811-1879) - Daniel and Esther Weisel - John and Anna Weisel, Elmer and Kathryn Weisel)

She's 79 years old, but nobody will let Mom Essl retire.

Not her doctor. When she asked him if she should finally stop serving food
- which for her means getting up at 3 a.m., to be in by 5, to start peeling
30 pounds of potatoes - the doc asked her a question right back:

"He said, 'What are you, crazy? That's what's keeping you going," the way
Bob Essl tells the story.

But that's just one reason why Bob doesn't want his mom - the waitress
everybody else at Essl's Dugout also calls Mom - to leave the restaurant he
has owned for more than 30 years. Another is that if things get busy or
help gets short, he can pick up the phone, call her and say two words:
"Mom, weeds."

After 60-some years of restaurant experience, she knows the long version of
that plea: "Mom, we're so jammed up right now, it's like we're stuck in
weeds too high to see our way out. So any chance you could rescue us by
stopping in to help out a while?"

She knows all that, so she doesn't have to hear any more of it.

"I just jump in the car and fly," she says - maybe to help out her
granddaughter, Patti, another regular waitress in this very-family-run
business on the Black Horse Pike near the borderline between Pleasantville
the West Atlantic City section of Egg Harbor Township.

Mom Essl - the real name's Harriet, but she doesn't like it and nobody uses
it anyway - says she actually has tried twice to retire and become one of
the 95.7 percent of New Jersey women in her age group who have said goodbye
to the job market. (But the U.S. Census says that Atlantic County women
older than 75 are twice as likely to still be working as women in the rest
of the state.)

Mom started her waitressing career at age 12, serving in an employee dining
room at Atlantic City's old Haddon Hall. Then she kept working at a series
of restaurants, up to and including the decades when she and her husband,
Fred Sr., were raising their four sons.

But she wasn't working in 1978, the year after Fred died. At first she
painted her whole home, inside and out, to try to work her way through the
pain. When she finished, she knew she needed something else to do, because
she can only spend so much time tending to her prize azaleas.

"So I was talking to Bob and I said, 'I'm gonna go find a job,'" Mom was
remembering over a cup of tea Monday morning, after her work shift ended.
"And he said, 'You already found one - come on down.'"

She started out just working breakfast, then picking up hours until she
worked right through lunch for years. Now she has cut back to the point
where she is scheduled to work only until 8 a.m. four days a week, but
that's after she gets in the door at 5, to start peeling the sacks of
potatoes for the Dugout's fresh-cut home fries.

Every Essl's waitress also has to hand-wash every dish and mug she serves,
because there's no room in the place for an automatic dishwasher. And it's
a point of pride for Mom that she never leaves a dish for the waitress who
follows her in the job - regardless of whether that's a granddaughter whose
diapers she changed or a new worker she just met the day before.

The bosses acknowledge that Mom's work ethic is part of the reason they
don't want her leaving - especially when they can tick off horror stories
about slightly less dependable employees, like the one who was supposed to
open up the place about a month ago and still hasn't shown up, or called to
explain why she didn't.

"Mom just holds the place together some days," says Bob's wife, Sharon. "If
you couldn't count on her, I don't know who you'd count on."

But Mom also admits that she uses this job to get what she wants out of
life. She doesn't have to work - no matter what the doctor ordered.

"I have a nice pension from my husband," who was a postman, she says. "But
I like the people here, and that's why I do it. ... When I did retire, I
couldn't stand it."

Plus, even when she doesn't have to peel potatoes, she still gets up about
3 a.m. to go through her morning routine, which features a heavy dose of
doting on "the light of my life," a 13-year-old poodle she calls Chelsea.

On the job, Mom isn't the classic, old-fashioned waitress who calls
everybody "Hon" - mainly because she has known most of her customers for
years, might have waited on them when they were children, and has no
trouble at all remembering their names, faces or favorite breakfasts.

In fact, she doesn't ask her regulars what they want as much as she tells
them what they always order - or just brings it without needing to hear an
order. Sharon says that when Mom sees a morning regular's face come past
the front window, she'll use that quick head start to have the guy's
favorite coffee mug filled and waiting at his favorite seat before he gets
through the door.

When she's not working, she does some volunteer work: Through her church,
she helps sick people - many of them younger than she is - by driving them
to see their doctors. But when she's on the schedule, Mom Essl is on the
job. And sometimes she's on the job even when she's not on the schedule.

"We all know she's 79," says Sharon Essl, Mom's daughter-in-law/boss. "But
I really don't think she knows she's 79."

To e-mail Martin DeAngelis at The Press:

MDeangelis@pressofac.com

Pictured on the front page of the article: During the 100th Weisel family 
reunion, a photo album attracts some of the older members of the 
clan.  They are (from left) H. Alan Weisel of State College, Win Weisel of 
Roanoke, VA, Magaret Kratz Webster of Doylestown; Elizabeth Stover of 
Lansdale, and Pat McKinley of Robesonia, Berks County. 

By Robert Armengol, Staff Writer 

CHALFONT – There days, it’s tough for any family to get together once a 
year.  Now try having hundreds of relatives spread out across the United 
States. 

For the Weisel’s descendants of a German couple who arrived in the New 
World with six children and settled in Bucks County about 270 years ago, 
it’s just a matter of persistence. 

One major branch of the family celebrated the 100th anniversary of its 
annual reunion Sunday at the Chalfont United Methodist Church. 

About 120 people showed up, some from as far away as Virginia, North 
Carolina and even Arizona.  The turnout was twice as it has been in recent 
years, said Winfred Weisel, outgoing president of the informal group that 
organizes the event. 

“Because it’s the 100th anniversary of the reunion,” he said, “we all did a 
lot of calling and writing to get the kids and grandkids to come 
out.  We’re very clannish.  We all have lots of children and grandchildren 
and we try to keep the group together.” 

Weisel, 84, is a great-grandson of Samuel and Catharine Weisel, the 
originators of this particular line.  A family tree printed on computer 
paper stretched 20 feet across the church’s community room, and Winfred was 
dutifully filling in some of the gaps with a sharp pencil. 

Winfred said his great-grandfather was a few generations removed from the 
first Weisels to come to America.  G. Michael Weisel and his wife, Susanna, 
landed in Pennsylvania in 1732 and were granted some of William Penn’s land 
along the Tohickon Creek in Bedminster Township.  The nearby Weisel Youth 
Hostile still bears the family name. 

In the 1800’s one of Samuel Weisel’s sons, Frank, bought farmland in 
Warrington, where he built the mill that gave Mill Creek Road its 
name.  After the reunion Sunday, his descendants were invited to tour the 
old homestead. 

In those days, the Weisels were hardy folk who made their living close to 
the land.  Today, the family is still hardy – many of those at the reunion 
were in their 70’s and 80’s – but decidedly modernized. 


They are doctors, lawyers, teachers, and researchers, to name a few 
professions represented Sunday.  One 24-year-old family member, Robin 
Gunthie, said she’s moving to New York to pursue a career in genetics. How 
appropriate. 

Relatives keep in touch by mail and over the internet.  Bonnie Martin, of 
Rochester, N.Y. maintains a Web page dedicated to keeping the family in 
touch and sharing photos.  Martin says she missed many of the reunions 
while rearing her own family, 

But since retiring from her job as a music teacher, she’s been trying to 
reconnect with her roots. 

“All of a sudden, I had a lot of free time,” Martin said.  “I had a chance 
to get in touch with a side of me I had neglected for 34 years.” 

Sunday’s reunion finished the same way it has for the past 100 years, with 
a brief business meeting.  The recording secretary read last years minutes, 
the family historian announced recent births and deaths, and the treasurer 
gave a financial report:  There is $204 in the bank for next year’s 
reunion, she said. 

Then everyone joined in singing, “Blessed be the Tie that Binds.” 

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