SING HIGH TO CLOSE
A 90-year institution in downtown Phoenix, the Sing High Chop Suey House, with owner Harlan Lee, will serve its last meal Sunday. Lee’s grandfather, Fred Lee, opened the eatery in 1928.
For 90 years, Sing High Chop Suey House has been a fixture of downtown Phoenix. Opened by chef and owner Fred Lee in 1928, the Chinese restaurant has served old-school Cantonese-American cuisine to generations of migrant workers, families and businesspeople — even well-known Arizona politicians such as former Gov. Rose Mofford and the late Sen. John McCain.
The menu hasn’t changed much through the years, says third-generation owner Harlan Lee, but the restaurant has moved twice since opening. It first moved in 1956 as development pushed Phoenix’s Chinatown south and again in 1981 when the restaurant was displaced to make way for a sports arena.
“I always joke that for every generation, there was a location,” Lee says. “It’s funny how that worked out.”
On Sunday, Sing High and the Lee family will serve their last meal at the current location at 27 W. Madison St.
But this time, there are no plans to relocate.
Lee’s grandfather, Fred Lee, opened the restaurant in 1928. At the time the restaurant was a mainstay of Phoenix’s small but bustling Chinatown, which lasted from about the 1870s to the 1940s in the area where Talking Stick Resort Arena stands today.
Sing High was one of dozens of restaurants opened by Chinese immigrants between 1900 and 1940. These mostly family-run restaurants served both Chinese and American fare to Chinese immigrants and a non-Chinese community comprised primarily of migrant farm workers. Other longgone restaurants of the day included Mandarin Cafe, Peking Cafe and Golden Dragon, with perhaps the most popular being American Kitchen, which opened in 1900 and closed its doors 1951.
Over the following nine decades, downtown grew and Phoenix’s Chinatown was pushed farther south, forc-
“For over 30 years my husband, Steve, and I had our ‘date nights’ here! Thank you for the memories.” Mason-Hernandez family
ing Sing High to relocate twice. First, from its original home to a second near Third Street and Madison. Then again in 1981 when the family purchased the building at 27 W. Madison Street.
Lee remembers shutting the doors at the last location on Nov. 11, 1981, only to open at the current location the very next day. This time, the family has not secured a new location.
“We have not ruled out the possibility of a new location. The thing is, you don’t just pick up a restaurant and move it in a few months,” Lee says, recalling how it took him and his father years to plan and execute the 1981 move.
“We’re going to kind of wind things down.”
The property has been sold to the Hansji Corp., which also owns the Residence Inn by Marriott and Courtyard by Marriott hotel located just north of the restaurant. The 19-story high-rise hotel opened in May 2017 and is part of a revitalization project that includes two historic towers, the Luhrs Building and Luhrs Tower, originally constructed in 1924 and 1929, respectively. Crews demolished the Industrial Congress Building, also known as the “Luhrs Central” building, to make way for the project in 2014.
Like the Luhrs towers, the Sing High building is listed on the Phoenix Historic Property Register under the name “Stag Hotel/Patio Hotel,” which once stood on the site. The building was originally constructed in 1931 and added to the city’s historic property register in 2001.
Amit Bhagat, Hansji Corp. vice president of operations, says the company has no concrete plans for the building.
“We had hoped Sing High would continue their lease and keep the restaurant open,” he said.
However, since the Lees opted not to renew, the company is now working with a broker to find a new tenant.
Since announcing the restaurant’s closure on Facebook in early July, customers have been flooding the restaurant to dine and, of course, say goodbye. Guests have been allowed to leave handwritten notes on the walls in the restaurant’s lobby.
“For over 30 years my husband, Steve, and I had our ‘date nights’ here! Thank you for the memories,” reads one note from the Mason-Hernandez family.
“My father brought the family every Friday night in the late ’60s and early ’70s. Tonight the shrimp brought back many memories. Thank you and best wishes,” reads another signed the Lerma family.
The closure is the end of an era for Lee and his family in downtown Phoenix.
“For me, it’s nostalgic. Both my wife and I are Arizona natives, and I grew up in downtown,” he says. “This has been my life for more than 30 years, so, yes, it’s sad.”
Lee, who took the reins of the family business in 1971, has seen the restaurant’s clientele shift and the city evolve. While once the restaurant relied on the commuters who filled the city center’s office towers for business, Lee now says the restaurant sees more families coming in to dine — often, families who have been frequenting Sing High for generations.
The restaurant’s fame as one of the city’s oldest also contributed to its longevity. In May 2017, downtown bar and restaurant Tom’s Tavern closed just shy if its 90th anniversary, making Sing High and its 90-year run even more of a rarity in the downtown neighborhood.
Sing High also won national attention after being featured in the awardwinning 2014 documentary “The Search For General Tso,” which explored the history of the film’s namesake dish and of American Chinese restaurants generally.
“We’ve become more of a destination restaurant than we were in the old days,” Lee says.
It’s partially for this reason that he says he’s open to the idea of relocating Sing High. But unlike in previous generations, Lee says he doesn’t have an heir to whom he can pass the torch as he ages.
“The thing is, there was always a son,” he says. “I don’t have that right now because both my kids are in different industries.”
Regardless of the future of Sing High, Lee says he’s looking forward to one thing: getting some rest.
“It’s been a great history,” Lee says. “If we come back in some form, that’s great. But 90 years? I can’t complain.”