Hector’s Café and Diner Served Village View Well

By Anthony J. Paradiso

I wrote an article in the June 2023 issue of The Village View about Hector’s Café and Diner titled Hector’s the Little Diner that Could. In it, I described how Hector’s was one of the hold outs of a bygone era in the Meatpacking District and that I thought they would still be there in 2030. It turns out I was wrong, as Hector’s closed for good on July 18 as reported by ABC 7 Eyewitness News.

This comes as a shock to me. Over the years, I found a second home in that solid red brick building with the bright, comfortable interior.

I deliver The Village View newspapers each and every month. The staff at Hector’s Café and Diner on Little West 12th Street has been kind enough to allow me to drop off 100 papers and position them at the cash register right as you walk in the front door. They have even let me have cookies for free when I came in tired after a long day of delivering The Village View.

Over the years, I’ve gotten to know co-owners Nick Kapelonis and Freddy Manjarrez who worked the cash register. Kapelonis is a die-hard New York Rangers fan, which I share with him and we’re always discussing our team’s future.

In an article written by Spectrum News, Kapelonis is quoted as saying, “‘It’s sad, it’s bittersweet, but it’s time to move on. Seventy-six years — how many people can say they had a restaurant for this long?’”

Kapelonis went on to describe how the neighborhood around the High Line has changed since 1980 which, according to the Spectrum article, is when his family started co-ownership of Hector’s. “‘Tourism is not the same. Most of the butchers left, so that was a big hit for us. The area’s changing. It’s becoming corporate,’ Kapelonis said. ‘After COVID, it took a dive and never recovered.’”

I interviewed Manjarrez for that article I wrote about Hector’s two years ago. At that time, he described how when he first started working there in 1994, there were butchers all over the neighborhood and it was very different than it is today.

I have made use of Hector’s for more than just food and newspaper delivery over the years. I also had lunch there with Roberto Monticello, the self-proclaimed “mayor of Meatpacking” in 2024. I interviewed him about the topic of turning the Meatpacking District into the city’s first “centralized arts district” with subsidized housing for artists, studios, galleries and performance spaces.

I learned from Monticello that the Meatpacking District used to be a hangout for meatpackers, gangs and the mafia. I was shocked because of what it is today — a haven for high-end eateries and stores.

Instead of an arts district, the city has come up with a plan to develop the 66,000 square foot lot, where Hector’s and the last Meatpackers reside, into “Gansevoort Square.” According to the NYC Economic Development Corporation website, Gansevoort Square will be “a 24/7 live, learn, work, and play, community and cultural hub for New Yorkers.”

After 76 years, Hector’s run has come to an end. The owner hasn’t ruled out possibly opening a new restaurant, but for now the only place you could go in the Meatpacking District or the Village to get cookies and ice cream for under 10 bucks is closed and I’m sad to see it go.

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One More Gone

By Alec Pruchnicki

When I moved into the West Village in 1993, I walked around the neighborhood a lot. The Meatpacking District was known for meat packing plants operating in the daytime and street hookers at night. I supposed that Hector’s Café and Diner served both populations of workers. Over the years extensive gentrification pushed out the hookers and most of the meat packing plants, but Hector’s survived. It also managed to survive Covid somehow and is still operating as I write this piece.

But the end is near. The last single block of meat packers is being relocated — to be replaced by an expansion of the Whitney Museum, a maintenance building for the High Line, a possible 60-story tall high rise, and a little green space. I thought that Hector’s, quietly tucked under the High Line, might survive. Yet, I was not too surprised when I saw the announcement in its window that it would close also. One more iconic location, at least for me, that will disappear. Simone Signoret once wrote an autobiography entitled Nostalgia Isn’t What It Used to Be, which describes my feelings accurately.

In my 32 years in the Village, I said goodbye to Ray’s Pizza and Gray’s Papaya, Gem Spa, and probably a few other places that I forget right now. The well-known, iconic places that I think are still going pretty strong are the White Horse Tavern, Cowgirl Hall of Fame, Strand’s Bookstore, Veselka, and McSorley’s. But how long can Ray’s Candy Store and B & H Dairy hold out? I think it’s time to pay those places a visit, and say goodbye while I still can.