By Ainsley Walters, Staff Reporter 
Chef Sydney Lawrence checks whether the soup is ready.
IT SEEMS to have been around for almost as long as the street it was named after.
Duke's Restaurant and Club is a landmark at the corner of Duke and East Queen Streets in downtown Kingston. The famous restaurant and club, once also a hotel, dates back to the early 1900s and still prides itself on serving up a steamy traditional Jamaican lunch.
However, relocation of nearby businesses, downsizing of others, drugs, crime and a gradual invasion of fast food outlets in and around the commercial district have combined to reduce the once mighty Duke's clientele.
Errol Salkey, proprietor at Duke's since 1984, remembers what he described as "the good old days".
"It also served as a hotel in the 1930s and 40s," he said. "The vacant rooms are still upstairs. I was told very prominent men used to come here."
Long before Salkey took over at Duke's in the early 1980s, its restaurant was the choice of eatery for officers from the Central Police Station, staffers at the then Jamaica Telephone Company, Government Printing Office, lawyers sauntering from their Duke Street chambers and also country folk disembarking the trucks and buses from Portland and St. Thomas.
"At the time, Duke's was the only restaurant of its kind in the area," Salkey said.
However, time brings changes and Duke's has not been spared. Several fast food outlets have sprung up downtown along with other eateries. The Government Printing Office was sold to its workers and hundreds left for good. The telephone company, now Cable and Wireless, required fewer operators and technicians, all translating into less customers for Duke's.
"The bank closed last year," added Salkey, referring to a Bank of Nova Scotia branch which was a few doors down. "When people went and changed their cheques at the bank their next stop would have been Duke's."
In addition, the Kingston and St. Andrew Corporation's (KSAC) 'no-parking' restriction also hurt the business.
"It has affected me a whole lot," said Salkey. "No parking is allowed on the left. If you park and come to eat by the time you order there's a wrecker lifting your car outside."
Duke's, Salkey pointed out, enjoyed a thriving night life but that too has slowed down.
"We haven't had any incidents," he said, "but a lot more people used to stop by before going home. In the mid 1980s, at midnight we had to be kindly telling people it was time for us to close."
For Salkey, Hurricane Gilbert in 1988 was a windfall.
"About two weeks before Gilbert hit we had just completed rewiring the building. We had to shut off the public electricity supply and use two generators.
"After Gilbert hit, because of the generators, we were the only operating restaurant downtown. People lined-up along East Queen Street to get food and a cold drink. We had to close the doors and serve through the windows," he recalled. "The generators aren't working now but I still keep them as souvenirs."
These days, Duke's is probably best known among skittles enthusiasts who defy the no-parking restriction on big-game Sundays.
"The good old days are gone," said Salkey. "I don't know if they'll ever come back."
