Swearingen, Wyoma Elizabeth "Susie"

Elizabeth “Susie” Swearingen loved working and couldn’t see how people couldn’t work. She started working in restaurants when she was 13 years old and considered herself “the best waitress in this town—bar none.” After working at several other restaurants, she decided she wanted to be her own boss and began leasing the Busy Bee Café, located at 108 ½ East Front Street in downtown Bloomington in 1958. She changed the name to The Happy Inn Café, but everyone always called it “Susie’s.” So, in 1970 she made it official and renamed her restaurant “Susie’s Café.” Susie was a remarkable and resilient woman. What she built, she built on her own. As a single mother raising three sons, Susie grew both a business and a reputation through sheer dedication and good, home-cooked food that kept people coming back year after year. She loved her customers deeply, and they loved her in return. Her generosity extended well beyond her own four walls — she was a steadfast presence in the community, always looking for ways to support her neighbors and fellow business owners. For nearly 40 years, Susie's Café was a downtown institution, and everyone was welcome.

Wyoma Elizabeth “Susie” Swearingen was born on October 31, 1924, in the village of McLean, Illinois at the home of her grandmother, Carrisana Wyatt. Susie (as she was known to most) was one of four children born to Sidney and Betty (Wyatt) Swearingen, Sr. Her father was a farmer and by 1928, had moved the family to Bloomington. The family rented most of the homes they lived in during their early days in Bloomington as her father worked as a laborer and a painter. Susie attended Bloomington public schools until the eighth grade when she dropped out of school and became a waitress, working first at Klemm’s Department store in the late 1930s, then later the Green Mill Café, the Grand Café, and the Federal Café.

On November 22, 1942, Susie married Robert Buford in St. Louis, Missouri. They settled in Bloomington and lived at 608 East Douglas Street for a short time. Robert Buford was born on November 13, 1924, in Heyworth, Illinois. He was a son of Cecil and Jessie (Sharp) Buford.

Less than five months after their marriage, Robert was drafted into the United States Army during World War II. He was sent to Fort Knox, Kentucky where he completed his basic training, and then sent to Camp Campbell, Kentucky. The couple welcomed their first son, Robert, a short time later on October 23, 1943. Susie and Robert had two more sons; James and Jeffery.

When their son Robert was just six weeks old, Susie landed a job at the Federal Café at 105 West Front Street. According to Susie, back in those days, “she was known as Elizabeth, but there were five other employees with that same first name. When everyone was assigned a nickname, Elizabeth became ‘Susie,’ and the name stuck.”

However, Susie and Robert’s marriage was not a happy one. Robert had a violent temper and drank heavily. Because of this cruelty, Susie took their three children and left him in 1947. Their divorce was finalized ten years later. Susie married for a second time, to James King, in May 1957. But that marriage was short lived when Susie filed for divorce in January 1962.

To support herself and her sons, Susie continued to do what she knew how to do best; work as a waitress. She thrived as a waitress and worked at several Front Street restaurants until a new Bloomington truck stop, the Five Star Truck Stop, caught her eye. She became one of the first waitresses to work there but quickly realized that she was not “cut from the truck stop cloth.”

Her sister Helen worked at a little restaurant in downtown Bloomington called the Busy Bee, located at 108 ½ East Front Street. Susie was quoted as saying she “would never work in that rat trap.” But she didn’t just work there, she ended up owning it. In 1958 Susie leased the Busy Bee and changed the name to The Happy Inn Café, but everyone always called it “Susie’s.” So, in 1970 she bowed to what the customers wanted because they have always been her greatest concern and officially changed the name to “Susie’s Café.”

By 1963, because of the successful business that she built on her own, Susie was able to settle at a permanent home for herself and her family. She moved to a house located at 1014 East Grove Street and lived there the rest of her life. What she built, she built on her own. As a single mother raising three sons, Susie grew both a business and a reputation through sheer dedication and good, home-cooked food that kept people coming back year after year.

In 1980, the restaurant was forced to move because the building was slated for demolition to make way for a four-story addition to the Bloomington Federal Savings and Loan Association located behind her restaurant. In a Pantagraph article about the demolition, Susie stated rather matter-of-factly that she would not relocate downtown. “There’s nothing down here except an administrative area. They (powers that be) don’t want retail stores.” However, Susie’s heart was downtown and so were many of her customers. She could not leave after working downtown for 37 years. She found a new location at 602 North Main Street. And as Susie said, her customers “would find her,” and they did.

Success and her loyal customers followed her to the new location. Susie’s Café became busier than ever. But in the Summer of 1988, there was an upsurge in customers. Susie did not like having customers wait. “We had people waiting at lunch and one day I counted 23 who walked away. I couldn’t stand it. I got so depressed. There was nothing I could do. I had a fast turnover, but people can’t wait.” Susie called upon her son, Robert Buford, who had just opened a restaurant in Florida, for help. He had opened a number of hotels and restaurants there and occasionally returned to the Twin Cities to work. He handled the food and beverage duties when Normal’s Sheraton Inn opened in 1982, so helping his mom with her business overflow was no problem. Robert came back to Bloomington to help his mom expand and run the restaurant. That fall, Susie and Robert leased the space next door (604 N. Main) and expanded the restaurant, adding 49 more seats, applied for a liquor license, and added an evening menu. Marcey Buford recalled that her uncle Robert added menu items such as a nice house salad with dressing he made, vegetarian lasagna (that reportedly their restaurant was the first to serve in the area), steak and lobster, fancy desserts, and a weekly fish special. Susie, however, left the night business to her son and was only interested in the extra tables for her breakfast and lunch crowd. “Nobody walks out anymore. That’s the greatest thing of all. It’s also a relief to have someone to back me up. I need to learn to let go. I try to do everything myself. I’d like to work 10 more years. My help has been with me a long time and we’ve all decided we’re going to quit together.”

Susie’s customers relied on her arriving at 5:15am every morning so that the first pot of coffee was ready for her regulars, like her “Knights of the Round Table,” six or seven guys, including Ken Holder, Herb Eaton, and Harold Gregor, who came in every day to eat lunch and sat at a round table in front of the lunch counter. Susie loved to kid back and forth with some of her customers. She stated that she would do anything she could “to torment some of the customers and they get me too…It’s a blast.”

Known for good, homecooked food, her noon meals of Swiss steak, panfried chicken, and meatloaf kept her customers coming back. Her menu (and prices) rarely changed over the years, including offering a cup of coffee for “24 and 2” and her 30-cent bowl of soup. “Everybody laughs about my soup. It’s 30 cents a bowl—you can’t open a can of soup for that. It’s my calling card” Susie said in a 1989 interview.  

And when you came into her restaurant, the Cardinals was always on a tiny TV and you had better follow her rules that were posted and applied to every customer who came in, no exceptions. In 1989 the handmade sign read: “Notice to all ‘The Clods’ who think you never mean them. In this face EVERYONE is asked to Keep your feet on the floor, Your butt on the seat! Your kids under control and seated. Comb your hair in the restroom (Ain’t No One All That Pretty) (We deal daily with these problems) Otherwise your in bad trouble) Susie’s Café.” Susie didn’t take no guff from anyone.

Susie was outspoken. She made no excuses. She makes no bones about what’s right and wrong. “I’m very outspoken, out front. I’ve worked long and hard and I feel I’ve earned it. I love working and can’t see how people could not work. I’d guess you’d just call me a workaholic. You have that jingle in your jeans and it feels great.”

However, behind that outspoken, no-nonsense demeanor was a heart of gold. Her customers were like family, and she took care of those in need. According to her granddaughter Marcey Buford, when the restaurant had food left at the end of the day, they would give the food to people waiting outside the back door. And any left after that, she would take to her boarding house on Clinton Street for those in need who stayed there. Susie and her staff packed lunches and filled thermoses. They sold meal tickets for $5.25, and customers would get $5.50 in food. People on pensions bought meal tickets at the first of the month so their meals are secure till their next pay day. During the holidays, there were presents and food for her patrons who had nowhere else to go or no family either.

And Susie’s was a saft place for members of the LGBTQ+ community. After the restaurant on North Main Street expanded, at night it became an unofficial gay bar before there was an official gay bar in the community. No one was in the closet at Susie’s, and no one had to hide who they were. Everyone was welcome at Susie’s.

Susie continued working 12 to 14 hours days right up until the very end. She was devoted to her restaurant and never considered retiring. Susie returned home from working all day on Tuesday, March 18, 1997, and went to bed as she usually does. However, at 5:15 a.m. the next day (March 19), Susie was not there to open the restaurant. She had passed away in her sleep.

After Susie’s death, her son Robert closed the restaurant and began helping local businessman C.J. Stolfa open a new restaurant called “C.J’s” on the south side of Bloomington. Robert worked as a chef for the restaurant, overseeing all of the food that went out for catering, and made all of the pies and soup that was served. 

Family and the community alike mourned the passing of one of Bloomington’s matriarchs. To this day, people from all walks of life fondly remember Susie, the meals they would share at her café, and the memories that were made.