When Life Throws a Curveball ... Sell Hot Dogs

Clyde Anhalt has had a lot of wild ideas. There were the macramé baskets, the family baking business and his brainstorm for an ice cream shop to be called Clyde-da-Scoop.

“He’s nuts,” his daughter, Sarah, said.

So when Clyde was laid off from his job as an assistant baseball coach at Oak Lawn Community High School after 12 years, he revived an old dream.

He bought a wiener wagon.

“I always wanted a hot dog business called Smilin’ Clyde Hot Dogs,” Clyde said. “I love steamed hot dogs and people enjoy them. People have a lot of fun with them.”

Clyde bought a wiener wagon from a woman who had a similar business in Oak Lawn called Miss Marge’s Famous Hot Dogs. Miss Marge sold Real’s Hot Dogs, so on Sunday Clyde invited relatives, friends and neighbors over for a free taste test of his latest venture. (Watch the video.)

Pitting Reals (pronounced ReeAl) against the Chicago-favorite Vienna Beef, Clyde tried out the wagon’s bun and red-hot steaming features for the first time.

“My dad’s a little crazy, but you wouldn’t love him if he wasn’t,” said Sarah, who inherited the family baking business. “This is the best idea that’s he’s ever had. There’s so much he can expand on with this. Good job, Daddy.”

Recalling such famous wiener tribute song verses–“I wish I were an Oscar Mayer wiener” and “Fat kids, skinny kids, kids that climb on rocks”–the afternoon’s winner was a Vienna Beef dog with a cucumber, mustard, diced onion, a steamed poppy seed bun and celery salt.

“It’s the perfect Chicago hot dog,” Clyde said.

In June, Clyde will be attending Hot Dog University at the Vienna Beef plant in Chicago. There, he will learn the art of steaming a Vienna Beef hot dog, as well as the rudiments of permitting and licensing.

“Everybody has a favorite hot dog place,” he said. “It’s nice to have a little wagon like this. It brings back a lot of memories.”

Clyde hopes to start selling his Smilin’ Clyde Hot Dogs at the men’s softball playing fields at 94th Street and Oak Park Avenue behind the Oak Lawn Pavilion. In addition to hot dogs he'll carry another Chicago favorite, Tomtom Tamales.

Meanwhile, he’s focused on the Oak Lawn Spartans’ postseason, his last as a baseball coach for the school.

“Don’t believe half the stuff they told you,” he says of his friends and families teasing him about past money-making schemes. “I’m not as crazy as they think I am.”