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Notable people · Business Founder · Restaurateur · Conservationist

Bob Evans

Gallipolis restaurant owner who began making his own sausage on his Gallia County farm in 1948 and built it into Bob Evans Farms, whose first restaurant opened on the farm near Rio Grande in 1962.

Born May 30, 1918, Sugar Ridge, Center Township
Died June 21, 2007, Cleveland Clinic, Cleveland

Bob Evans
Public domain · Wikimedia Commons

At a glance

Born
May 30, 1918, Sugar Ridge, Center Township (Wood County) source
Died
June 21, 2007, Cleveland Clinic, Cleveland (Cuyahoga County) source
Buried
Mound Hill Cemetery, Gallipolis (Gallia County) source
Also known as
Bob Evans
Education
Greenbrier Military School, Lewisburg, WV, to 1937, graduated with honors
Ohio State University School of Veterinary Medicine, Columbus, OH, 1937-1939
Known as
Business Founder, Restaurateur, Conservationist
Organizations
Bob Evans Farms

Life story

Robert Lewis Evans was born in 1918 at Sugar Ridge, Wood County, to Welsh-descended parents. His family moved to Gallipolis in 1929. He finished at Greenbrier Military School in West Virginia in 1937 and studied veterinary medicine at Ohio State from 1937 to 1939.

He bought a malt shop in Gallipolis in the early 1940s and sold his share when he was drafted in 1943. In 1948 he began making sausage on a farm in southeastern Ohio and opened a 12-stool diner in Gallipolis to sell it.

Bob Evans Farms was incorporated in 1953 and by 1957 had four sausage plants. The first new Bob Evans Restaurant opened in Chillicothe in 1962, and the company went public on Nasdaq in 1963. It grew across Ohio and then into other states; by 2012 it had more than 500 restaurants in 19 states.

Evans retired at the end of 1986. He was a longtime wildlife advocate and supporter of 4-H, FFA and Ohio State agriculture programs. He died in 2007 and is buried at Mound Hill Cemetery in Gallipolis.

Ohio ties

  • Sugar Ridge (1918)
    birthplace Wood County · source
  • Columbus (Ohio State University) (1937-1939)
    studied in the School of Veterinary Medicine Franklin County · source
  • Gallipolis (1940s-2007)
    the Malt Shop, the steakhouse near Gallipolis where the sausage business began, and his burial place Gallia County · source
  • Rio Grande (Bob Evans Farm, Raccoon Township) (1952-1970s)
    farm bought from Rio Grande College in 1952; the family lived in the Homestead farmhouse for nearly twenty years; site of the first Bob Evans restaurant Gallia County · source
  • Mound Hill Cemetery, Gallipolis (2007)
    burial Gallia County · source

Timeline

  1. 1918 Born on 30 May at Sugar Ridge, Center Township, Wood County, to Stanley Lewis Evans and Elizabeth Lewis, both of Welsh descent. source
  2. 1937 Graduated with honors from Greenbrier Military School in Lewisburg, West Virginia, and entered Ohio State University's School of Veterinary Medicine, where he studied until 1939. source
  3. 1940s Bought the Malt Shop in Gallipolis, selling his interest when he was inducted into the Army in 1943. source
  4. 1946 Opened the Terminal Steakhouse near Gallipolis, later renamed the Bob Evans Steak House and known for its breakfasts. source
  5. 1948 Began making sausage on his farm to serve at his 12-stool diner in Gallipolis. source
  6. 1952 Bought the old Nehemiah Wood farm near Rio Grande from Rio Grande College and moved into its farmhouse. source
  7. 1953 Friends and family joined him as partners to incorporate Bob Evans Farms, Inc. source
  8. 1962 The company opened its first restaurant, The Sausage Shop, on the farm. source
  9. 1963 Bob Evans Farms, Inc. sold shares to the public for the first time. source
  10. 1971 The first Bob Evans Farm Festival was held at the Rio Grande farm. source
  11. 1986 Retired as president and director of the company on 31 December. source
  12. 1987 The Homestead, nominated with help from Bob Evans Farms staff as the Wood Old Homestead, was listed on the National Register of Historic Places on 14 December. source
  13. 2005 Was among the first honorees of the 'I'm a Child of Appalachia' campaign. source
  14. 2007 Died on 21 June at the Cleveland Clinic, aged 89, of complications of a stroke while recovering from pneumonia; 579 Bob Evans restaurants were then open in 18 states. source
  15. 2017 Golden Gate Capital bought the Bob Evans restaurant chain, including the Rio Grande farm, on 1 March; Post Holdings bought the remaining food business in January 2018. source

What Bob is known for

  • Founded Bob Evans Farms, incorporated 1953
  • Opened the first Bob Evans Restaurant in Chillicothe in 1962
  • Honored three times by the National Wildlife Federation
  • Bob Evans Farms Inc. (1953)
  • Bob Evans Restaurants (from 1962)

Stories

Sausage for a 12-stool diner

In 1948 Evans began making sausage on his farm to serve at his 12-stool diner in Gallipolis. Five years later, in 1953, friends and family members became his partners in Bob Evans Farms, Inc. The company built its first restaurant, The Sausage Shop, on the farm in 1962, and went public in 1963; its first restaurant away from the farm opened in Chillicothe. By 2012 there were more than 500 Bob Evans restaurants in 19 states. Evans ran the company as president until the end of 1986, and spent more than forty years on wildlife conservation; he was the only Ohioan honored three times by the National Wildlife Federation.

Source

The Homestead was a stagecoach inn

The brick house at the center of the Bob Evans Farm was built in 1820 for Nehemiah Wood, one of the area's first postmasters, who had come from Virginia in 1805 and lived first in a log house on the site. It stood on the Gallipolis-Chillicothe road, the Jackson Pike, and served as a stagecoach stop and, from about 1830, as the way station on the mail route from Gallipolis to Chillicothe. In 1862 his son Harrison Wood got the first federal license to run it as an eighth-class inn. A 1927 Gallipolis Times article, drawn from tavern registers since lost, listed guests including Senator John Sherman, lawyer Samuel F. Vinton and Governor William 'Fog Horn Bill' Allen. The Wood family kept the house until 1938. The Evans family added the front porch with fluted Doric columns around 1953, and the 1987 nomination drew on a typescript history of the Wood family written by Jewell Evans.

Source

Inventions and firsts

All Ohio inventions and firsts

Honors and things named for them

  • Honored three times by the National Wildlife Federation (only Ohioan to be)
  • 2005 "I'm a Child of Appalachia" inaugural honoree

Named for Bob Evans

  • Bob Evans Restaurants and Bob Evans Farms (now Post Holdings' Bob Evans brand) (New Albany (restaurant headquarters), Franklin County) source
  • Bob Evans Farm Hall, University of Rio Grande (Rio Grande, Gallia County) source

Family

  • wife: Jewell Victoria Waters
  • father: Stanley Lewis Evans
  • mother: Elizabeth Evans (nee Lewis)

Sites to know

Homes, graves, markers, museums and monuments; the numbered ones are on the map.

1234
  • 1 The Homestead (Wood Old Homestead, NRHP 87002144), Bob Evans Farm
    791 Farmview Road, Bidwell, near Rio Grande (Raccoon Township) Gallia County · source
  • Bob Evans Restaurant on the farm, site of the first restaurant (The Sausage Shop, 1962)
    10854 State Route 588, Rio Grande Gallia County · source
  • 2 Bob Evans grave, Mound Hill Cemetery
    Gallipolis Gallia County · source
  • 3 Bob Evans Farm Hall, University of Rio Grande
    Rio Grande Gallia County · source
  • 4 Sugar Ridge (birthplace community) (unknown)
    Sugar Ridge, Center Township Wood County · source

Places in Ohio to see

Ohio places

Where Bob Evans was born, lived, worked and is remembered, with the ZIP code, town and county pages for each.

Myths and corrections

Things often said about Bob Evans, and what the record shows.

Often said Bob Evans was a native of southeast Ohio's Gallia County.

The record He was born at Sugar Ridge in Wood County, in northwest Ohio, and came to Gallipolis as a young man in the early 1940s, when he bought the Malt Shop there. source

Often said The Bob Evans 'Homestead' was the Evans family's own family homestead.

The record The house was built in 1820 for Nehemiah Wood, ran as a stagecoach inn and mail stop for decades, and stayed in the Wood family until 1938. Evans bought the farm from Rio Grande College in 1952, and his family lived in the house for nearly twenty years. source

Documents

Primary records: patents, letters, court and government files, nominations and old county histories, each at the archive that holds it.

Pictures

Free to use with the credit shown. Select a picture for the original and its license.

  • Bob Evans Farm & Restaurant, Rio Grande, Gallia County, Ohio, United States
    Bob Evans Farm & Restaurant, Rio Grande, Gallia County, Ohio, United States
    Public domain
  • Smokey Bear's 65th Birthday party celebrated at the Bob Evans Farm, in Rio Grande, Ohio. The event was a collaboration b
    Smokey Bear's 65th Birthday party celebrated at the Bob Evans Farm, in Rio Grande, Ohio. The event was a colla...
    Wayne National Forest / CC BY 2.0

Further reading

Sources

Confidence. Medium: the main facts were confirmed, but some details (often an address or ZIP code) were not.

Every link goes to the original source. Profile researched 2026-10-15.

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