Myra Kaye Hancock, the owner of The Place: A Local Eatery on Sixth Street, died Friday at her home of natural causes. She was 57.
She served her last lunch customers on Wednesday and offered up a new soup, cabbage stew. She fussed over the seasoning to the last minute and asked an early customer to taste-test it for her.
That’s how things worked at The Place, where a loyal circle of customers ate from a counter that extended into the kitchen at the back of the old building.
“I want people to feel like they are sitting at my kitchen table,” Myra Kaye said one day as she watched a carpenter build the counter several weeks before the restaurant opened in March 2012.
Hancock’s death was a shock to her family and friends. Although she had been mourning the death of her husband and business partner, Dean Place, on March 10, Myra Kaye and her daughter, Scarlett Hancock, kept the business going and filled several large catering jobs during the holidays, in addition to the lunch business.
Dozens of condolence messages poured into Myra Kaye’s personal and business Facebook pages Friday afternoon.
“You will never know just how many hearts you have touched with that infectious smile of yours!” a friend said.
Another wrote, “Such a sad day for Hoptown.”
Myra Kaye grew up in Hopkinsville. She was the daughter of the late Ben and Sidney Smithson. Her father was a real estate broker. Her mother was a nurse and owned a daycare center. Two older sisters, Patricia and Sherri, survive her.
Her downtown restaurant was part of the revival of Sixth Street. The Place was filled with family photographs and keepsakes. She had her dad’s Hopkinsville High sweater on the wall. She put her grandmother’s old Christmas trinkets on the counter. Her grandchildren’s artwork and letters from friends were taped to the restaurant refrigerator.
Almost every day, Myra Kaye served a burger, a sandwich or a salad that was named for a regular customer. All of the specials ran under the menu label “Mighty Fine,” which was one of her dad’s favorite sayings.
Myra Kaye’s first restaurant job was at the popular Bartholomew’s on Main Street in the 1980s. Later she was part-owner and manager for J’s on Main, which she helped start in the former Cayce-Yost building next door to Bartholomew’s. After J’s on Main closed, she lived in Florida for several years and managed a bar in Naples. She and Dean met in Florida.
In addition to her daughter and sisters, Myra Kaye is survived by six grandchildren and one great-grandchild.
Arrangements are being handled by Christian County Cremation and Funeral Care. Services will be announced later, according to the funeral home’s website.
Jennifer P. Brown is co-founder, publisher and editor of Hoptown Chronicle. You can reach her at editor@hoptownchronicle.org. She spent 30 years as a reporter and editor at the Kentucky New Era. She is a co-chair of the national advisory board to the Institute for Rural Journalism and Community Issues, governing board president for the Kentucky Historical Society, and co-founder of the Kentucky Open Government Coalition.
