Local restaurant owner Nicholas Assimakopoulos, well-known and respected in the community for his hard-working lifestyle, died on June 29.
Assimakopoulos and his wife Anna have operated the Drift-In Restaurant in downtown Drayton for the past 23 years. The couple recently sold the restaurant and was preparing to retire when Nick passed away over the Canada Day long-weekend.
Longtime Drayton businessman Ab Hesselink was a regular at an informal breakfast club that developed at the Drift-In.
“I just loved the place. It was great, the people were great,” said Hesselink .
He noted customers were often lined up prior to 6am waiting for the restaurant to open.
“The same crew goes every morning. That’s the meeting place. They served the community well,” said Hesselink.
John Green, of Drayton, another breakfast regular, described Assimakopoulos as “a very wholesome family man,” who was “very kind and generous to those he was close to.”
Assimakopoulos came to Canada in 1961 after serving as a police officer in Greece. He was joined by Anna, then his fiancée, in 1967. The couple has three children, three grandchildren and numerous nieces and nephews.
Hesselink describes Assimakopoulos as “a hard-working guy” who was well respected in the community.
The Drift-In was a seven-day-a-week operation and, although they always maintained a residence in Waterloo, the owners lived over the restaurant at one time. Hesselink said the restaurant’s annual open house, at which they opened up the restaurant and fed all who stopped by, became an annual community tradition.
“It was almost like they ended up becoming family to many people because they were always open, that’s all they ever did – they worked seven days a week,” said Hesselink. “They’re just marvelous people.”
A funeral service was held at St. Peter and Paul Greek Orthodox Church in Kitchener on July 3.
