I miss My Pi.I was fortunate to have helped build the My Pi in Tulsa in the early 70s and then later, one in OKC (there were only two of us). We used Malaysian mahogany 1" thick planks and solid cedar paneling. It was 220v time and carbide blades. I also did the stain glass window installation and trimming. The heavy maple front doors were 3" thick with a golden Pi symbol for handles.
The Bose sound system and reel-to-reel tape deck was great. The people who set up the configuration were professional installers. The Bose system was fairly new to the market and the location of the speakers were akin to primitive surround sound. The big central fireplace was also taken into account for the music. The ceiling was painted black so diners would get a feeling of being under an open night sky instead of in a restaurant. They also thought of putting tiny lights in the ceiling tiles to mimic stars, but that was canceled because the deadline for opening was coming up.
The owner, Larry, was from Chicago and returned there after the place was completed but would make surprise visits from time to time. He said he got the idea for the deep-dish pizza when he was a boy. He said he couldn't eat certain things but the "pie" worked. Larry was a good guy.
All of the ingredients of those pizzas and other offerings were not canned. The kitchen staff prepared everything from fresh. The hearts of lettuce were torn out and discarded, the mushrooms and tomatoes were in crates, and the sausage and pepperoni were cut by them. Larry didn't allow "store bought" items in the food. The pizzas were cooked at an exact temperature for an exact period of time. I guess that's what made the food so tasty.
A few years later, there was a great flood. We, along with the renters, had to clean tons of mud from the businesses. Anything below a few feet was toast. The My Pi doors were ruined. Whoever applied the varnish (we didn't build them) didn't bother with the bottom of the doors, so when the water hit they soaked, swelled and split and were never replaced and the pizzeria closed a few months after that.
As an aside note, my boss apparently had never seen a Pi symbol, or had forgotten it. He was from a little West Texas town that couldn't afford extra math symbols, or even grass. He was calling the soon-to-be-built place "My IT", until corrected by Larry.
My Pi had the best pizza and pizza sandwiches anywhere in the world and we could have a discount lunch there each day if we wanted. I took several dates there and no one was ever disappointed and the place was always crowded. Too bad it's gone from Tulsa. Many people have commented that we haven't had a descent pizza since.
