Gone But Not Forgotten: Joe Tess Place

August 12, 2023

Joseph Tesnohlidek, a commercial fisherman, opened a soft drink parlor which he later converted to a tavern at the end of Prohibition. Following the example of many Eastern Europeans at the time, he simplified his name to Joe Tess. Joe Tess Tavern was located south of the 24th Street business district where the road curves to the east.

Picture of the original Joe Tess Place. The apartment upstairs is where Mae Tess continued to live after selling the business.

Joe began displaying his catches from the Missouri River in a display case in a corner of his bar around 1935. The ploy to pull in a few extra customers by offering a snack launched what would become a South Omaha institution when his wife, Mae, began frying carp sandwiches in a cast-iron kettle and selling them for 15 cents in 1937. At that time, she could only cook six pieces at a time. She told the Omaha World-Herald that “people would snap ’em up as fast as I could cook ’em.” After about a month they had to install large fryers to keep up with the demand. The popular sandwiches were served on thin rye bread and came with hand-cut jacket fries and creamy coleslaw.

Picture of the unique boat style bar that was acquired from New Orleans.

During World War II, Joe closed the tavern and instead focused on the fish market which was located in the basement. Housed at 5460 South 24th Street, the building had large concrete pools through which fresh water was constantly pumped from a special well. This is where Joe kept the live fish until it was time to butcher them. While he dedicated the former tavern space on the main floor to displaying and selling the fish, oftentimes customers would just walk down the stairs where they would form a line behind Joe. They picked up their fillets from the cleaning table as quickly as he could prepare them.

The restaurant reopened by 1947, at which point Joe began buying fish from commercial fishermen rather than getting them from an increasingly polluted Missouri River. The restaurant business really began to take off by then, and in 1951 he built three large fish ponds which were fed by natural spring water in a ravine at 19th and North Street. By the time of his death in 1957, they were serving as many as three tons of fish per day.

2011 photo looking inside Joe Tess Place.

Mae continued to operate the restaurant for a few years after Joe’s death but eventually sold it to Bill Falt in 1963. Falt started working at Joe Tess Place at just 13 years old and went on to open a fish market at 20th and L Street with his brother before returning to Joe Tess. Even after she sold the business, Mae continued to live in the apartment upstairs from the restaurant. The restaurant remained popular even after its founder’s death, and on Friday nights people would line up along the sidewalk waiting for a table. Business was so good that Falt expanded it by opening a second location at 6572 Ames Avenue in 1979, followed by a third in Lincoln in 1982.

2015 photo of the fountain inside Joe Tess Place.

The expansion of the Kennedy Freeway resulted in the original building being torn down in 1984. The new building was constructed just a few lots north of the original. At that point the address changed to 5424 South 24th Street. The new, larger location also contained a live fish market but added the convenience of a drive-thru window in addition to a large parking lot. By this point, Mae had moved to an assisted living facility. Despite the closure of its other locations, Joe Tess remained popular and was featured on Guy Fieri’s “Diners, Drive-Ins and Dives” in 2009 along with other Omaha restaurants.

When the pandemic hit, Joe Tess closed its dining room and, like many other restaurants, focused on takeout orders and continued to operate its drive-thru. Business never recovered, and the dining room never reopened. Staffing shortages and supply chain issues were cited alongside the pandemic as reasons for the restaurant’s permanent closure in June 2022. Today the building at 5424 South 24th Street remains for sale.

Content written by Omaha Exploration. See my website for sources. If you enjoy my content, sign up to receive emails or make a donation on my website. You can also follow along or subscribe on my Facebook page. Thank you and keep exploring!