Published: December 12, 2008 02:14 pm      

Skyline Chili in Russell closes

RUSSELL — The nation’s banking crisis has claimed another local business.

Skyline Chili in Russell closed its doors for the final time at the end of business on Sunday, owner Debbie Miller said.

The restaurant, which opened in April 2004, was the Ashland area’s only source for cheese coneys, three-, four- and five-ways and other dishes made with the world-famous Cincinnati-style chili brought to America in 1912 by Greek immigrant Nicholas Lambrinides.

The shutdown resulted in 12 people losing their jobs, said Miller, who owned the restaurant with her husband, Ed. Employees were notified of the closure Monday morning.

“The worst part of it was saying good-bye to all those people,” she said. “We all sat around until early afternoon Monday. No one wanted to be the first to leave.”

Miller, who’s executive director of the Highlands Museum and Discovery Center, said she and her husband made the decision to close the restaurant after being notified recently by their bank that their financing would not be renewed this coming spring.

“We searched for new financing, but that’s just not happening right now” because of the economic situation, she said.

The decision to shut down was made on Friday, when it became evident that a new financing source wasn’t going to materialize, Miller said.

Miller said she and her husband, a chemical engineer at the Dow Chemical plant in Hanging Rock, also had doubts about whether the restaurant could survive the winter, when business is typically slow.

She said she was saddened by the closure and felt partcularly bad for the workers, some of which had been with the restaurant from the beginning.

“We definitely were like family,” she said.

KENNETH HART can be reached at khart@dailyindependent.com or (606) 326-2654.