Sam Miller’s restaurant in Shockoe Slip closes permanently

Sam Miller’s roots on East Cary Street date back to 1901. (Mike Platania photo)

One of Shockoe Slip’s longest-running restaurants has quietly closed its doors. 

Sam Miller’s at 1210 E. Cary St. recently ceased operations after 53 years in business. 

Throughout the spring the oyster bar and restaurant was open sporadically, at one point posting signage on its front door that it was closed “due to circumstances beyond our control.” The closure became permanent in recent weeks. 

Sam Miller’s was owned by Ken Wall, who couldn’t be reached for comment. Wall had been a longtime manager at the restaurant and took over ownership after the death of previous owner Tom Leppert in 2021. Its building is owned by local investor and developer Alex Griffith, who declined to comment. 

The restaurant’s 6,000-square-foot space is now being marketed for lease. Thalhimer’s Annie O’Connor and Katie Siegel have the listing. 

Though the modern Sam Miller’s opened in Shockoe Slip in 1972, its roots go back to the early 20th century. 

Sam Miller, a Polish immigrant, first opened the restaurant a block east at 1301 E. Cary St. under the name Sam Miller’s Exchange Café in 1901. It ran there until its closure in 1909, but over 60 years later, in 1972, local businessmen Claus Tholand and Danny Brown reopened it. 

More changes came in the mid-1970s and into the 1980s. In 1975, Leppert and Cliff Cline took over the restaurant, and in the early 1980s it moved to its current location. 

Mike Byrne, who owned a previous Slip-based incarnation of local brewery Richbrau, worked with Leppert at Sam Miller’s beginning in the ’80s and was a co-owner at the restaurant from 1993 to 2000. He said that in its heyday Sam Miller’s had a jazz club in its basement and hosted other live entertainment. 

Along with players like developer Andy Asch and The Tobacco Company’s Jerry Cable, Byrne said he thinks Sam Miller’s and Leppert helped Shockoe Slip become the epicenter of the city’s restaurant community at the time. 

“We were the place to go. We were the restaurant-centric district of downtown,” Byrne said. 

Byrne said he doesn’t blame Wall for Sam Miller’s closure. “The nature of restaurants downtown has changed dramatically since COVID,” he said. “The whole neighborhood has morphed into something different. It’s more lawyers, investment firms and (hotels).”

The 2000 split between he and Leppert was amenable, Byrne said, noting that they remained friends until Leppert’s 2021 passing.

In an industry where many restaurants struggle to reach five years in business, Byrne described Sam Miller’s 53 years as unheard of. 

“It’s a pretty remarkable run,” he said. “It’s dear to my heart.”

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